There are few cases in Armenian media, when a media outlet apologizes retrospectively to its readers for publishing unverified information.

When the Football Federation of Armenia officially announced that Vardan Minasyan had been appointed as the head coach of the national team, the website Armsport.am rushed to apologize to its readers for having published unreliable information three days ago.

The website, referring to its source, wrote on April 7, that the position of the head coach of the Armenian National Team will be the coach of Pyunik, Armen Gyulbadaghyants. And in this case, the fire wasn’t without any smoke. Gyulbudaghyants was appointed as the head coach of the youth team, as per decision of the Football Federation of Armenia Executive Committee.

Details as to why Armsport’s editorial team was so sure of the reliability of the information that Gyulbudaghyants was going to be appointed as the head coach of the national team, and why they were so quick to apologize to the readers, are provided by the website editor, Arman Arakelyan.

“As far as I remember, Armsport has been a fanatic, and, especially when it comes to providing reliable information about Armenian football, we have tried to do everything. Through our investigation, we found out that Armen Gyulbudaghyants’ candidacy is being discussed by the Football Federation of Armenia President. And relying on our sources, we have written that Gyulbudaghyants will be the head coach. The question of forming a coaching headquarters was even discussed. And if Vardan Minasyan refused the Football Federation of Armenia’s proposal, the next choice would definitely have been Gyulbudaghyants.

Journalists from other media outlets have been delighted by the fact that we made a mistake. They have created posts on Facebook, but let them try to extract the information and circulate different names as foreign press does. If I am not mistaken, aside from Armsport and Armtimes, no other news outlet attempted to get that information. I am not ashamed of this mistake, because we have done extensive work with our team beforehand, we learned other important information, especially that Ruben Hayrapetyan has met with Gyulbudaghyants two times,” said Arman Arakelyan.

Armsport’s editor-in-chief notes that they have apologized to readers, taking into consideration the trust that they have towards the website. It is a step taken out of feeling responsibility towards the readers. “Our speech is influential for our audience. After the news about Gyulbadaghyants, many comments and letters were received. People believe in our news. That is why we considered apologizing as being the right thing to do.”

Gagik Aghbalyan