Motd

[Sproggy]

There's a woman who does the co-comms on the early BT Sport game on a Saturday who is very good.

I think the issue is that for whatever reason pretty much all the channels have decided that punditry ability is no longer a required attribute to be a pundit. When they compound that with the obvious box-ticking that's going on it just makes things worse.

Maybe there is just a lack of people out there of any gender or race than can talk sensibly about what just happened in a football match?

[Row Z]

In the build up to their goal, you’ll see the same Brentford player (13) hit the floor at the near post under pressure from Amdouni…

Would seem like it’s a ploy from their player to try and win a penalty by initiating the grappling. That one didn’t get any appeals, although their goal did follow and the appeals for Muric on Toney were louder.

For what it’s worth Muric clearly punches the ball away and was big and physical - something we’ve been crying out for Trafford to show.

[Rileybobs]

The problem isn’t the gender of the pundits. The problem is the criteria which seems to be that the female pundits have represented the popular Lionesses within the last 5 years. Pretty much every female pundit I can think of has represented England very recently. Alex Scott being an exception and she was the trailblazer, so to speak.

The problem with this is it leaves a very narrow pool of ‘talent’, so it really is no surprise that the likes of Carney and Farah are extremely poor pundits. If you applied the same criteria when selecting male pundits then you’d probably see equally bad punditry. But because there are a lot more recognisable male footballers they are able to select ‘slightly’ more erudite people like Glen Murray who has had a relatively less impressive career but is a more renowned name.

Regardless of this, I can’t see who benefits from someone like Farah appearing on one of the BBC’s flagship shows.

[CoolClaret]

The problem isn’t the gender of the pundits. The problem is the criteria which seems to be that the female pundits have represented the popular Lionesses within the last 5 years. Pretty much every female pundit I can think of has represented England very recently. Alex Scott being an exception and she was the trailblazer, so to speak.

The problem with this is it leaves a very narrow pool of ‘talent’, so it really is no surprise that the likes of Carney and Farah are extremely poor pundits. If you applied the same criteria when selecting male pundits then you’d probably see equally bad punditry. But because there are a lot more recognisable male footballers they are able to select ‘slightly’ more erudite people like Glen Murray who has had a relatively less impressive career but is a more renowned name.

Regardless of this, I can’t see who benefits from someone like Farah appearing on one of the BBC’s flagship shows.

Not even sure why it has to be an ex player of recent year? Tons of out of work managers etc.

You get far better analysis off a Youtuber sat in their mum's basement giving match breakdowns. Just really poor I thought of the beeb who I do expect more from.

[IanMcL]

Really don’t understand your first Joey Bartonesque sentence.
Your second point was spot on - ie you can be ill informed, inarticulate or plain dumb whatever gender you are.

Where we are possibly in agreement is that people are being giving roles presenting football and sport in general because of their gender or background rather than their ability to do the job and that is not only wrong but it’s also diluting the quality massively.

But the people making these decisions clearly have other priorities and targets to meet and if that means in the long term more women etc wanting to be involved in careers in sport (or other walks of life that historically they may not have been) then that’s a positive thing (for future generations rather than ours maybe !)

If my first sentence is Josephesque, so be it. His main point started as men play the men's game abd women their game. Experts for eaxmch, should come from those players.

That is my point. I like when the women, talking about the women's game, are able to forgive insights on the players, their interaction with them etc.

They have nothing to offer like that, fir the men's game, fir obvious reasons and vice versa.

I also like articulate pundits. Some are awful (both sexes)

Other comments, on here, like, 'well drilled' 'debut' 'Chelsea loanee' 'scuffed' just highlight the vacancy of the content and non expertise.

I have no issue with diversity. I have issue with non expertise, for obvious reasons.

[Rileybobs]

Not even sure why it has to be an ex player of recent year? Tons of out of work managers etc.

You get far better analysis off a Youtuber sat in their mum's basement giving match breakdowns. Just really poor I thought of the beeb who I do expect more from.

Completely agree that it shouldn't be the criteria, but it obviously is. I guess it is an attempt to tap into the popularity of the Lionesses and broaden the viewership with a younger, and more female audience. Clearly if this reduces the quality of the product to such an extent as it did last night then it's going to backfire massively. Last night seemed like an experiment, with just 3 games on and presumably a much lower audience, and I'd be surprised if we see it repeated.

[ISpeds00]

no1 likes us

[taio]

I've only seen it the once, live as it were, but I'm pretty sure that one
of them referred to Muric as playing well on his debut or similar !!!!!!!

Thank goodness I only watch it when we win. Shocking last night,
absolutely shocking.

They specifically said premier league debut

[CoolClaret]

They specifically said premier league debut

To a neutral with no more understanding that could have meant full debut - a little explanation of the GK situation would have surely been appropriate there, no?

[taio]

To a neutral with no more understanding that could have meant full debut - a little explanation of the GK situation would have surely been appropriate there, no?

Not really bothered either way. Just saying that PL debut, not full debut, was explicitly said.

[CoolClaret]

Not really bothered either way. Just saying that PL debut, not full debut, was explicitly said.

Yeah that was the host, it was more the other 'pundit' that really didn't have a scooby that was the most disappointing aspect of the show.

[Brugge Claret]

FA Cup today ,who picked the colours that Leicester are playing in ? poor do if you’ve still a black and white Tv.

[Brugge Claret]

FA Cup today ,who picked the colours that Leicester are playing in ? poor do if you’ve still a black and white Tv.

[jlup1980]

Farah Williams gives Garth Crooks a run for his money as being the no.1 worst pundit on the BBC. She really is painfully boring and offers no insight to the game at all. My 10 year old son could offer more knowledge than her and he doesn't even like football!

Worst of all, she does a lot of damage to other, more credible and articulate female pundits and presenters. She's the kind of pundit that Joey Barton can hang his hat on, and as much as he's an idiot, you can't argue against the fact she's appallingly bad.

If the BBC want to provide a mix of male and female presenters and pundits, which I have nothing against at all, they need to bin off the likes of Williams as she does nothing other than provide ammunition to those who don't want to see a mix of pundits.

[mikeS]

New BBC trailer from Aardman.

https://youtu.be/IftwW9rueAk?si=nKiZHMOZwbOsAhlj
Excellent.

[kentonclaret]

Got to be a deliberate ploy by the Beeb, can we start a campaign to keep Lineker

Lineker was on FA Cup duty ready on hand to take the pi$$ out of Alan Shearer for Newcastle failing yet again to end their FA Cup drought.

[claptrappers_union]

On ITV just now, Ian Wright had just stated that Ahmads winner against Liverpool wasn't a ‘clean strike’…

What's going on with these pundits?

[Big Vinny K]

On ITV just now, Ian Wright had just stated that Ahmads winner against Liverpool wasn't a ‘clean strike’…

What's going on with these pundits?

It wasn’t a clean strike.

[Jakubclaret]

Farah Williams gives Garth Crooks a run for his money as being the no.1 worst pundit on the BBC. She really is painfully boring and offers no insight to the game at all. My 10 year old son could offer more knowledge than her and he doesn't even like football!

Worst of all, she does a lot of damage to other, more credible and articulate female pundits and presenters. She's the kind of pundit that Joey Barton can hang his hat on, and as much as he's an idiot, you can't argue against the fact she's appallingly bad.

If the BBC want to provide a mix of male and female presenters and pundits, which I have nothing against at all, they need to bin off the likes of Williams as she does nothing other than provide ammunition to those who don't want to see a mix of pundits.

If you separated it men to men & women to women everybody would know where they stood with it & you wouldn't get the bitching & moaning. At the moment it's all over the place.

[claptrappers_union]

It wasn’t a clean strike.

The point I'm making is that they seem to find a negative in winning goals. I don't know why they need to say it.

[Commy]

Murray, well known for his cheating, makes his opinion of no consequence. It’s an embarrassment that he is paid for his views.
It was obviously 50/50 in any case

I remember the penalty he 'won' and missed at their place. He moved his foot in between the defenders and went down like a sack of spuds.

[Big Vinny K]

The point I'm making is that they seem to find a negative in winning goals. I don't know why they need to say it.

He just said it wasn’t a clean strike - you’re overthinking it. In the same analysis the pundits spoke positively about him saying the main thing he did right was hit the target.

The 2 city goals yesterday were both huge deflections. Unsurprisingly the pundits and commentators mentioned that too.

[jlup1980]

If you separated it men to men & women to women everybody would know where they stood with it & you wouldn't get the bitching & moaning. At the moment it's all over the place.

Surely it's easier to just make sure all pundits are actually capable of analysing and presenting? It doesn't matter either way then.

[Jakubclaret]

Surely it's easier to just make sure all pundits are actually capable of analysing and presenting? It doesn't matter either way then.

Good luck with that 1 I guess in fairness it's just about as remotely achievable as my suggestion I won't be holding my breath anytime soon

[warksclaret]

Oh for John Motson

[Fretters]

It's the lack of knowledge that bugs me.

"We didn't know much about that from him" (On Muric's passing ability) being an example. The usual pundits seem to spend the day watching their games and researching the key players (e.g. a goalkeeper making his first start of the season) but she seemed to know nothing about him.

[Silkyskills1]

Not lack of knowledge but more lack of research I would suggest. Laughing out loud or making a crass joke can keep one employed it seems. However, I can't pass opinion on the content because if I do happen to see a televised game( which is extremely rare) then invariably the commentary is turned off and I never watch anything pre match or post match. I just compare it to watching the Clarets and someone at the game telling me what happened, should have happened etc. I bloody know, I'm watching the same game.