I wrote a piece for When Saturday Comes last week about the Black Country Derby. It wasn’t so much a preview of the contest between West Bromwich Albion and Wolverhampton Wanderers – more a piece giving a bit of context and history to the fixture. As such, it may still be of some relevance and interest:
Former England cricket captain Nasser Hussain tells an interesting story in his autobiography about Sir Ian Botham’s time as a selector. It’s worth quoting in full:
“The problem was that Beefy is such a legend, people do listen to him. Not only the David Graveneys [Chairman of Selectors] of this world but also people in the street. So you would jump into a cab and the driver would say, ‘That Ian Botham. He talks a lot of sense.’ And I would always feel like turning around and saying, ‘Well, in my opinion Ian Botham was a genius who could do things on a cricket pitch that no other man could before or since, but he couldn’t really explain to you how he did them.’ By the end of his time advising the selection panel, I was virtually listening to what he thought I should do and then doing exactly the opposite.”
I’m reminded of this anecdote when I hear folk on Twitter push for James Richardson to present Match of the Day. Some are calling for Guardian journalists to take up their positions in those punditry seats. In Bed With Maradona, the football bloggers collective, are even trying to launch a TV Revolution, such is the outrage in some quarters at the standard of punditry in this country.
But I wonder. Is there an element of preaching to the converted here? The very nature of Twitter, and indeed life in general, is that – more or less – you gravitate towards like-minded souls. The point is, one has to doubt whether the proverbial cab driver is merrily telling all and sundry that Jonathan Wilson ‘doesn’t half talk some sense.’ The feeling remains that he is more likely to be saying it about Alan Hansen or, heaven forbid, Alan Shearer.
It isn’t as though the idea hasn’t been floated. ITV have dipped their toe in the water with the presence of the football journalist Gabriele Marcotti on their Champions League highlights programme. Marcotti has provided an alternative slant on things – giving details that so many ex-pros don’t, while evidently biting his lip when listening to a colleague describe Inter as Milan for the umpteenth time. But has he really made an impact on the viewer? Could it be that the vast majority are still half-cut on the sofa wondering what the bloke they’ve never heard off with the funny accent is wittering on about?
It’s easy to become immersed in football when you love the game. Such is the depth of information available to the modern football fan. However, the job of mainstream television is to appeal to a broad audience and, all too often I’m afraid, that means the lowest common denominator. Where’s the mileage in delighting one person by providing a Zonal Marking chalkboard analysis, when ten others would much prefer to hear ‘media personality’ Robbie Savage indulging in a bit of – here comes that word – ‘banter’ with the touchline reporter.
The difficulty is that the more high profile the football match is, the more broad the appeal, and the more people will be watching. And that means you get World Cup games that are watched by my mum and my sister. When those games come around, they are the majority – not you and I. Consequently, they’re not going to want half-time of the England vs Germany match to be dedicated to a tactical breakdown of why Mesut Oezil is being allowed to roam between the lines … they want to know why Lamps’ goal was disallowed and what the hell we are going to do about it.
The great thing about football coverage these days is that however much information on the weekend’s games you want to consume, you can do it. There are tactical blogs, financial blogs, humorous blogs and sites focusing on everything in between – many are high quality and they’re all freely available at the click of a button. Twenty-five years ago, until a foreign player had been featured in World Soccer, the only detail you would know about him would come from the Panini sticker album – in other words: club, height, hometown and date of birth.
Maybe you’ll accuse me of under-estimating the general public. But right now, I think we should be thankful for how far we’ve come and enjoy the fact that the game we love is appealing to millions of people at hundreds of different levels in thousands of different ways.
There could well be a revolution one day. Until then, just remember: ‘That Alan Hansen. He talks some sense.’
BackPageFootball have put together a compilation of the Top 50 players in the World.
They have done so by asking their readers and selected bloggers/writers and then totting up the results. Let’s be honest, it’s got to a fairer way than anything FIFA could come up with.
The results are being released block by block. I provided the ‘pen pic’ for No.13 on the list: Iker Casillas. For that piece, and the rest of the players ranked No.20 – No.11 please click the link below:
Another month, another superb edition of Calcio Italia.
The usual columns by Gabriele Marcotti, James Richardson and Tor-Kristian Karlsen are all there. In addition, there are also features by James Horncastle and Dan Ross.
I have contributed to the magazine – writing a They Retired The Shirt feature on Franco Baresi – which I hope readers will enjoy.
If you would like to buy the magazine it can be purchased from most WHSmith shops or ordered online here.
