Dissa-punditry

Oh, the joys of a TV Licence! I recently discovered them after coming home from a hard week's work - and a strenous series of booze-drinking marathons - to find that we have three and a half hours worth of Football League highlights, Five hours of chaotic, yet perfectly co-ordinated fun on Sky's "Soccer Special" (You know the drill, a host of ex-footballers and makeshift sports reporters getting excited over massive games... such as Huddersfield vs Yeovil), and an approximate 380 minutes of live football, brought to you by Rupert Murdoch's propaganda wagon, Sky Sports.

Quality. Integrity. Expertise. That's what should follow a flurry of goals, and a hastily arranged highlights package. Yet, what hampers this familiar, and natural flow seems to be pundits who have been rounded up with giant fishing nets. After all, you look at who is slouched on the expensive, probably swedish cream sofa's, and get treated to a pile of trout. Perhaps I'm being unfair; they are paid to offer their opinion, their opinion is offered, the show ends with a few opinions offered by footballing bastians such as Jamie Redknapp, and people's champion, Robbie Savage - now making more appearances for the BBC than his beleaguered Derby County side.

Or maybe I'm taking this a little personally. After starting a three-year course in Sports Journalism (Don't laugh, it's actually a REAL course!), I cannot help but feel my oppurtunities to rise through the ranks, prove myself at the highest level, and become established as a reputable journalist are being marginalised by 'familiar faces'. Alas, I suppose that's what sells though. Thinking about it pragmatically, the prospect of seeing Mark Lawrenson and Alan Hansen disect the day's most important games, with their amazingly over the top computer technology, is a lot more appealing than me and my mates from just another university going over the screen with our cursors and admittedly, if given the chance, just drawing comedy beards on the managers when there's a break in play, using the same Microsoft Paint tools Alan and Mark use to highlight where runs could've been made, and what areas should have been attacked.

There's a trust issue too. Four young, unshaven journalists let loose in front of a a national audience would be a disaster. Even seasoned campaigners, who have travelled the length of the country and dug out the most minute detail of a Carlise and Plymouth 0-0 draw in the depths of winter, just would not reel in the viewers. The fact that Jamie Redknapp was a Liverpool icon, Andy Gray will always be the world's most scottish man, and David Platt was (through gritted teeth and clenched fists...) an important goalscorer just have elements to it that make their opinion worthwhile. Yes, that's hard to take, but a reality that won't change soon.

Think about it, the major institutions now have their own show-stealing double acts: Sky Sports have Richard Keys and Andy Gray, the two stalwarts of sports broadcasting that balance banter with analysis perfectly. It would be criminal not to mention the Jeff Stelling and Chris Kamara partnership, the host and livewire pundit respectively, on Soccer Saturday. So many classic moments between them, due to Kammy's eccentricity, and Jeff's razor sharp wit. Feel free to reel off any of Stelling's genius one liners to yourself... Finished? Great! However, what Sky also have, as previously eluded to, is Jamie Redknapp. Many guests have appeared in their studio's in a bid to show they can still talk a good game - Ruud Gullit. Sven Goran-Eriksonn. Even Bruce Grobbelaar. Yet none as single minded, and clueless as Redknapp. He sits, slyly swaying on his comfy spinning chair, offering no more than reviews of the bleedin' obvious.

"So Jamie, another comfortable win for Chelsea..."

"Yeah, they've won comfortably again, Chelsea... time for a knee's up, Richard?"

Admittedly, that has not happened... Yet. I urge you to just take in the next combined hour of analysis the smarmy cockney has to give, and see if you feel a dash more enriched, or bit pissed off as you've just wasted quite a lot of your sunday afternoon listening to Jamie Redknapp. And I made you do it!

As for the BBC, they have quite a vast empire. Local Radio, and yes, of course I'm going to use BBC Radio Nottingham as an example, are the best example of build-up, reporting, and analysis. Colin Fray and John McGovern make an excellent commentary team, all held together by the glue in the middle, Robin Chipperfield, holding together four and a half hours of unrefined sport with interviews, reviews, and a look into the possibilities of the afternoon's games. Truly hard workers, with a very special end product. However, and this is going to sound random, but having the dis-pleasure of listening to BBC Radio Humberside whilst visiting family in Hull this weekend, I was treated to two clowns in a 10 minute epic of trying to pronounce "Junior Stanislas", leading to a failure to report on two goals and a penalty incident at the KC stadium. I will not name these fellows, for I have compassion.

Then we branch out to BBC Radio 5live, with a plethora of commentators, reporters, pitchside men, anylasists, and tea ladies all working frantically to produce what is really, a quite comprehensive round up of the hectic programme of saturday sport. Although changing the commentators every twenty minutes works well as a system, it does suffer a little from "Too many chefs" syndrome. However, when Alan Brazil and Graham Taylor are sharing the mics, I reconmend you listen in - Taylor referred to Brazil as 'Stupid' on air, and naturally, it wasn't taken too well. You won't have to fine tune you're frequencies to detect that frosty atmosphere!



And then of course, there is the BBC TV network, spearheaded by Match of the Day. Alan Hansen and Mark Lawrenson are the best pair seen on a saturday night since Holly Willoughby ('s cleavage) presented Dancing on Ice. You just cannot get mad at them, they are part of the very bright, very stylish furniture. However, someone I will allow you to get mad at is one Steve Clardige, the former Millwall and Portsmouth striker who is the main pundit on The Football League show, hosted by a rather well conducted Manish Bashin. Claridge, the missing link in Darwin's chain, seems to start arguments no-one is connected to, involved with, or interested in. He also seems to just agree with everything Manish says, yet I suppose people like Steve do have to be spoon-fed. He is perhaps the person most out their depth, at giving in-depth analysis. Something that hasn't gone un-noticed, is that pilchard in sheep's clothing, Robbie Savage, has wormed his way onto the oh-so coveted studio sofa's. No-one in the right mind will tune in to see his honest opinion, it's more of a morbid curiosity factor. People are not thinking this man is the Albert Einstein of footballing tactics. It's more down the lines of 'Now would be a great time for a studio light to come crashing down...' Only time will tell if he can become the next Gary Lineker - God knows what crisps Savage would endorse. Cheat and Onion? Ready for a-salting? Prawn Cockhead?

I'll leave you to devise your own vulgar jokes, but the fact of the matter is that you can study all of your life, receive the highest honours at the most prestigious university, and become quite the integral journalist, yet all that will pale into comparison when you have a twenty year journeyman style career under your belt. Unfortunately, this is a market that will only get narrower, and with the celebrity culture that has engulfed Britain, it will have to be a famous personality, instead of a Joe Bloggs, that tells you why Wolves were never going to beat Liverpool, as you scoff your pot noodle, idlly channel-surfing, and waiting for the freeview porn to get a little naughtier. Maybe the girls will touch each other tonight?

So, looks like we will all have to make do with the mindless droning of the people that made it, yet still wouldn't mind a few more grand in the back pocket, sacrificing quality for curious interest.

Steve Rider, Andy Townsed, and Clive Tyldesley - The ITV representatives... No news is good news, right? Except you Andy. You could also do with a muzzle.