Comments on: That most disgraceful profession

By: Brickfields Gunners

Brickfields Gunners — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 05:34:28 +0000

Diceman , we are on the same wavelength .I usually ignore our pundits’ comments and only look out for some new snippets of information .In the movie ‘Fever Pitch ‘,there is mention of ‘the Micheal Thomas moment’which occurs ever rarely in ones’ life . But my moment had come a few seconds earlier
when a clearly panicked Steve McMahon was signalling 1 minute to his teammates -I knew then that we would win.I had never seen a more rattled team in my life.

By: Valentin

Valentin — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 13:40:20 +0000

When on French TV commenting France game Arsene Wenger try to stay respectful of Domenech but you can clearly sense that he does not rate him, does not like him and ore importantly disagree with both his tactic and his man management. Arsene Wenger try not critise manager publicly even if in private he will tell people what he really think. I travel with him once in a Eurostar train and our coach was quickly invaded by Arsenal supporters. Even some Spur fans came to ask questions to the great man. The funniest was Are you going to join Spurs as he had not yet sign a new contract with Arsenal at the time.
The problem is SKY who clearly have their own agenda: try to create controversy by appealing to the most moronic aspect of its viewers. Controversy means that more people spend money.
During ‘You’re on SkySports’ they were clearly trying to engineer some kind of Mike Ashley backlash but that did not fly as a lot of sensible Newcastle fans came and pour down on that idea. The guy has lost money on the club so he is not the great Satan making money from the club a la Hick and Gillet.
Because of the Liverpool and Spurs mafia within the Murdoch owned mafia, Arsenal is often pillored for no good reason and Liverpool given a pass.
For years, it was clear that Liverpool were living above their means. Anybody mentionning that was shot down. Last Saturday when Charlie George mentionned that Liverpool FC may be forced to sell Torres and Steven Gerrard if they drop out of the Champion league, Big Nose Thomson refuse to entertain that idea and got very angry. The problem is that the financial numbers bear that. RBS and Wachovia already tried to force Liverpool to accept Manchester Arab offer of £70 millions for Torres. Liverpool avoided that Doomsday scenario by promising to pay £62 millions of interest annually and the owners issuing a personnal guarantee of the capital.
The other problem with pundits is that often they do not make any research before showing up. Their knowledge of footbal is the one from the era they played. They do not know the new rules and they have no idea of financial matter (if they had they would be on the beach drinking a cocktail rather than commenting on a cold night a championship game). Most do not even understand tactic and formation. The minimum they could do before commenting a game is reviewing the club. They know less about clubs that casual supporter of that club and that should not be the case.
Remember a couple of season ago, when Henri Lansbury came in and Mark Lawrenson complained about another French kid coming in and his co-commentator had to tell him that Henri was English. Mark Lawrenson only answer was to joke about his name being French and that he got selected because his name had confused Arsene Wenger. Not only was that offensive to Arsene Wenger but he also showed a complete lack of knowledge of Arsenal promising young players.
The same thing happen with Sanchez Watt, who was even refered by some badly informed newspapers as South American, with clearly the journalist not having even bother to check his details on Arsenal Web site.
Mind you with the Sun being caught a couple of week ago by a old story resurfacing in NewsNows due the Web Site updating its structure. That show the level of research and application done by the great British writers.
Regarding the Carling Cup game, Skrtel committed an onbstruction and when committed in the penalty box obstructions are punished by a penalty. That should have been a penalty.
Kuyt deserved a red card, yet after the game nobody mention it as if it was normal behaviour. If Song had committed the same act he would have quartered and shown numerous time on TV. Just enough time for him to get a restrospective red card.

By: walter

walter — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:57:42 +0000

Well diaminedave, you have a valid point. With my article I infact did what the pundits do. In a moment I’m going to start to hate myself.

Well the big difference is that I don’t get paid for it.

By: simianwolverine

simianwolverine — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:45:48 +0000

ESPN in Asia has a wonderful combination. Steve McMahon (Ex-Pool) and Shebby Singh (Nicknamed Spuddy Singh by us Gooners). So whenever this two talks we never hear one thing decent about Arsenal. Before the season start they almost predicted Arsenal will be in the bottom half with numerous flaws. One match against Everton stopped all that. The Manchester matches have given them some weapon, lets see how many days they harp on that.

By: Diaminedave

Diaminedave — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:45:31 +0000

Great article and as usual stops and makes you think.

There are lots of different types of pundit out there in media land and I suspect that both as article writer and posters we are also now becoming part of the punditry landscape!!

By: diceman1984

diceman1984 — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 08:59:58 +0000

I have one for you all……

Steve Mcmahon, yes he is one of the so called top “pundits” on tv shows where I live.
Now, I think you all remember how heartbreaking it must be losing to Arsenal on that faithful day when he clearly was telling his teammates there’s only “1″ minute left.
So it suited well for him to never give any credit to Arsenal. He, along with Alan Hansen in the past, stated clearly that we will not win anything with this young side. It’s not the first time a former liverpool player tried to outsmart himself.

And he also said that Liverpool are serious contenders…..for what actually? Funniest goal of the season? I would think so. He too said in the past that a great rival of ours a couple seasons ago and last season Villa would beat us into the top 4. How stupid was he? A very naive point of view from an ex-player who after 20 years still holds that grudge against a better side.

And so I stopped taking him and others seriously, when I watch them talk I go for my own sense humor. It’s so funny when they always got everything, especially about Arsenal FC, wrong.

By: Brickfields Gunners

Brickfields Gunners — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 05:23:26 +0000

Another good article Walter.I have to agree with Marc about piss poor pundits.I have no problems with ex-players turned pundits who are not biased and give rather interesting insights and opinions based on their varied experiences , especially those who have played in the lower leagues or managed clubs .It is refreshing and eye-opening.What pisses me off are those who trawl the cesspool of gutter/garbage journalism [ie.tabloids & moronic blogs ],and proudly announce to all their’ brilliant ‘ deductions.LRV got it right ,but where do you exile them to ?In my country we have a wishy -washy pundit [a Spuds fan] who spews crap and ever so often gets it wrong and continues still despite having both feet in his mouth.I always bet against his predictions and end up guessing right.His score for Arsenal vs Spuds ? 2-2 ,and I am laughing in anticipation of an Arsenal thrashing of the enemy.

By: walter

walter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:41:57 +0000

I only now saw the first comment from Flint.
And Flint I can assure you that AW does not turn into an idiot when he is the third commentator on french TV. For some reason all French national team football is always commentated by 2 reporters and sometimes have a third person with it, and this is the case as long as I follow football (some 40 years now).
Now I do speak and understand French and Wenger is very much himself when he sits there. Always calm and never calls for ones head. Not even for Domenechs’ head and I think he is sometimes the only French man in not calling for his head.
I always find it rather cool when he sits there and talks about football more in general and describes the problems for a manager during a game. He never says he should do this or that. He really is a gentleman in almost everything he does.
If the French national team plays a game, I usually take a look to see if Wenger is there just to hear him talk af half time or after the game about football.
A bit funny is that he now sometimes has a little English accent in his French. I really like his French accent when he speaks btw.

By: walter

walter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:25:15 +0000

Well shota gunna, I can swear on my childrens head that English is not my first language.

And yes sometimes a pundit can say something intresting. I’m not gonna deny it. But I think it is something of a once in a season that I learn something from the pundits I see on tv.

By: eduardo

eduardo — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:18:06 +0000

great article tony, but I’d expect nothing less.

It is clear Redknaff, big nose thompson, Hansen and Lawerenson all hate Arsenal, as already pointed out alot of this stems from defeats they suffered at the hands of Arsenal, this is also Shearers problem.
Le Tiss is outstanding and even handed on all he covers and should have Redknaffs job.

The major problem now is that the EPL and FA do not run football in England, SKY does, they set the agenda, they decide which tackle is worthy of scrutiny and which incident deserves hour after hour of their attention and so influence the FA and EPL into taking action. What was their big focus yesterday – was it ManU fans going on the rampage at the CC game on Tuesday, of course not, it was not Millwall fans or Arsenal fans so thier big topic for debate was trying to get Toon fans to be outraged that their owner who has lost millions of his money on the club wants to generate income for the club by selling the rights to the name of the stadium and so toon fans will not be able to call it St James’ Park, as what its called ever helped Newcastle win a game. It is this drivel from SKY that is ruining the game.

By: Bobby Pliers

Bobby Pliers — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:12:37 +0000

Redknapp the younger knows Stately Home (Fook Hall) about anything. How Sky think that he can give an unbiased objective report on a game usually involving his Dad is beyond me. Souness surprises me because I truly believe that he is one pundit who isn’t afraid to be honest and usually is very complimentary of the job that Arsene Wenger is trying to do.

By: Lanz

Lanz — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 20:20:40 +0000

Nice one. So these guys exist everywhere? We do need global, concerted efforts against them. UN Security Council to the rescue?

By: Marc

Marc — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:01:30 +0000

I don’t have a problem with pundits. I have a problem with piss poor pundits, unfortunately they seem to dominate the half time airwaves. I don’t have a problem with someone who shows a little bit of favouritism due to an allegiance to a team they have played for but some of what you hear is ridiculous. A few weeks ago Phil Thompson declared that there is now a top 3 and Arsenal have been relegated to the group fighting for 4th (Villa, the Spud’s, Man City etc). It was clear at the time, and has become even clearer over the last few weeks that Liverpool have problems so serious that the glimpse of their new Italian player last night could be one of few because if he is any good they might have to sell him in the summer because they are desperate for the money. Jamie Redknapp last night proclaimed that Chelsea, ManU, Man City and Liverpool all have far greater financial muscle than Arsenal, which is why the Youth System is doing so well at Arsenal because without it we are screwed. Did anyone point out to him that Liverpool are broke and ManU sold their best player in the summer spending only a fraction of the money they received?

I really wonder what it will take for the media to acknowledge Arsenal’s standing in the game and the amazing job that Wenger has done.

By: shotta-gunna

shotta-gunna — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:26:37 +0000

What is even worse are the so-called “Arsenal bloggers” who simply echo and re-echo the tripe they heard from the pundit-ocracy? Most pundits (England and elsewhere) seem simply to echo the current prejudices and biases of their audience. The best pundits over the years are those consistently willing to take position contrary to conventional wisdom but increasingly the media which I am most familiar (American and English)now seem to be a mission in dumbing down their audience.
Good piece Walter – I can’t believe that English is not your first language.

By: don't believe the hype

don't believe the hype — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:06:05 +0000

Well said Walter – pundits are a waste of space, their opinions are mostly hackneyed cliches, which the average fan could come up with themselves. It’s a rare one who has anything of worth to impart. But sadly most people get their opinions from them as I discovered in a recent conversation with some friends who rate Hansen and Rednapp as good pundits!

By: anaconda

anaconda — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:51:23 +0000

Darius Stone: 4. Arsenal are much weaker this season as they haven’t replaced Tuore and Adebayor.

***

I don’t know whether you did it on purpose, but the mandatory misspelling of a players name is definitely part of their style. Although those that we call doomers do it more consistently.

By: walter

walter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:46:24 +0000

Now I look at it again on my screen, Sir Idiot really looks a nice name.

By: walter

walter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:43:25 +0000

And now in answer of the refs view.

The case Watt I shall translate what I wrote in my match report for the Benelux fans: “One of the first actions from Sanchez Watt was a dribble with should have brought him alone in front of goal but he was clearly wrestled off the ball with a clear foul from Skretel and brought to the ground. This was a clear penalty, but we are not West Ham so the ref waved play on.” I stick to this and hey… they missed out on this on MOTD yesterday.

But the pundit didn’t mis the penalty appeal on the other side of the pitch. And here comes the ref in me. It was a penalty. He stuck out his arm and made himself bigger and thus prevented the ball going to goal (not say it would have been a goal). If the ref had blown I wouldn’t have crucified him on that.

So yes I’m rather sure we got lucky on this but in the end of the day the ref didn’t give what should have been an penalty for both sides and no complaints because it only would have changed the score line if they both would have been converted.

But if we would have been 3-1 up I don’t think Liverpool would have put in the same amount of energy at the end. But this is only guessing off course and my one, biased, opinion.

Seen the ref miss some strong arms coming out, even the dutch reporter of the channel I was looking said that Kuyt was lucky not to get a red card for his elbow. In my country such incidents are red carded.

By: walter

walter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:32:42 +0000

To Meat Heart, I would like to say that yes the pundits are becoming a part of the game. In my view a rather meaningless part but we can have different opinions on that.
I think if you would examing MOTD that almost half of the time is spend on the pundits opinion and the other half on the games itself.
If I look a football game I would like to see the ball moving and not the mouths telling rubbish (like on referee decisions).

And then again, it just happened that I had nothing else to do that moment so I just wrote it down.

And that you call me an idiot is something I really dont care about. In my country we have a strong “geuzen” tradition. That is the tradition in which we make a word that is meant to insult me/us, we turn it in to an honorary title.

With the power that is given to me by the owner of this blog I salute you
Yours sincerly

Sir Idiot also known as Walter.

By: walter

walter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:25:24 +0000

As I, Johnny Foreigner, can not watch all your channels I only can talk about BBC MOTD and the pundits in my country on the paying channels (as far as Arsenal is concerned). But you can tell how some pundits hold a grudge against Arsenal.
Alan Hansen still has not yet digested the Anfield 89 game.
Alan Shearer every time he was close to succes with Newcastle it was almost every time Arsenal who came in to denie him.
Gary Lineker, well we all know where he played so no further explation needed.
Alone at the load off nonsens they tell about refereeing issues is making me laughing out loud. So I know the rules because it’s my job (hobby) and it leaves me some times wondering: are there other rules in the UK then in my own also Fifa country rule book ? No it is so dependable on the clubs involved to influence their judgement.

About the refereein questions I am going to answer in another comment in a minute or 2.