Poor Ray Parlour

[Red Chilli]

Is he still paying his ex-wife off?

[thesilverfoxlfc]

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I think he is and will be till the kids are 18(Long way off)

[Shaggy]

Parlour does Setantas coverage of the Champs League

Setanta cover the CL?

[Neil Young]

I haven’t watched ‘You’re On Sky Sports’ for a long time but I saw some of it last night.

Ray Parlour is the latest ex-pro to try his hand at punditry, and watching him blunder and bumble his way through the show last night was akin to watching a car crash. I felt quite sorry for him. Almost everything he said made no sense or was a cliché. He seemed a nice bloke but clearly that’s not enough. The best was this beauty…

Talking about Allardyce…

“At the end of the day, results pay the key.”

It’s not his fault though. Presumably Sky have some sort of interview/informal chat with prospective pundits? Why, then, do they always seem to pick the dim and inarticulate ones? I just don’t get it? Maybe these people speak well ‘off-camera’ and go to pieces on air…I don’t know.

I’d love to see Sky dump ex-pros and journalists, and just find some ‘regular joes’, football fanatics obviously, who can actually string a sentence together and speak well about the game. Maybe we could put forward some candidates? Silverfox?

I shudder at the thought to be honest. I saw a bit of LFCTV the other day when they had three fans in the studio giving their thoughts. It was banal. At least with ex-pros you might get an idea of how things are seen by people within the game or who know the game in an entirely different way from the likes of us.

Of course nearly all of the ex-pros are terrible. If we have to have pundits, I'd rather have managers and ex-managers than someone who has just retired from playing.

[thesilverfoxlfc]

Setanta cover the CL?

Yeah Setanta Ireland have the matches Tuesday and Wednesday nights Ireland only plus we get the 3pm kick offs on saturday its worth switching your English SKY Cards to Irish ones

[Shaggy]

I shudder at the thought to be honest. I saw a bit of LFCTV the other day when they had three fans in the studio giving their thoughts. It was banal. At least with ex-pros you might get an idea of how things are seen by people within the game or who know the game in an entirely different way from the likes of us.

Of course nearly all of the ex-pros are terrible. If we have to have pundits, I'd rather have managers and ex-managers than someone who has just retired from playing.

It was banal? Isn't that exactly the same as ex pros and, yes, ex-managers? Most managers/ex-managers are ex-players anyway...i.e. a bit thick.

I've seen the fanzone thingy and other similar 'platforms for the ordinary fan' and they're always cringeworthy but it's just because, as with the supposed 'experts', they appear to pick the most inarticulate, blundering fools they could find.

[Neil Young]

It was banal? Isn't that exactly the same as ex pros and, yes, ex-managers? Most managers/ex-managers are ex-players anyway...i.e. a bit thick.

I've seen the fanzone thingy and other similar 'platforms for the ordinary fan' and they're always cringeworthy but it's just because, as with the supposed 'experts', they appear to pick the most inarticulate, blundering fools they could find.

Obviously you're right about Fanzone - it really is a zoo.

I agree most pundits are banal but that's no reason to have different pundits who are equally banal but whose chief claim to fame is, er, that no-one has heard of them.

Like I say, I think some ex-managers can be interesting (I like Pleat's tactical analyses in The Guardian for instance). Managers might well be ex-players but not all ex-players make managers. Someone who has prepared a team to face the likes of AC Milan, someone who habitually analyses other teams, someone who has experience of what substitutions to make and when...Someone who has only been a player hasn't done these things so IMO isn't really qualified to be a pundit, except of course to impart such pearls of wisdom as to whether a player "meant to hurt" another player or whether "he'll be disappointed with that".

[dww]

Most football shows simply aren't set up to contain any interesting analysis though. They move too quickly and demand strident opinions.

The only time on TV in recent years anyone has attempted to give a really interesting insight was Venables when he was on ITV. However they always seemed to he in a rush to get to the next point and therefore allowed one of the other bleating morons to jump in and offer a ludicrous exaggeration or platitude (as appropriate) or worse still to get Andy Townsend to make the point much less well, but with shinier computer graphics, in a ****ing truck in the middle of a Sainsuby's car park somewhere.

There is no point having a good analyst and then use the current standard format for a football show IMO. It would also help if they had better journalists as presenters and interviewers in a bid to eliminate some of the drivel that gets spoken. Every time I hear a pundit or presenter say something along the lines of 'he's not that sort of player' and no one challenges it I become unreasonably angry. Sky Sports News is the worst for repeating this sort of ludicrous crap.

I think some of the things in the print press (especially the Guardian) is good as at times is the Time's podcast. Gabriel Marcotti seems to be good at getting good analysis out of managers for print but is bloody awful when asked to contribute on Football Italiano (I'm largely blaming the presenters in that case). I also like James Richardson as a presenter.

[McDermotX]

or worse still to get Andy Townsend to make the point much less well, but with shinier computer graphics, in a ****ing truck in the middle of a Sainsuby's car park somewhere.

Legendary........is the only word I can use

http://www.the-onion-bag.com/image.php?story=73&io=1&ft=jpg

[disco]

Parlour has to pay for his divorce somehow....

[Marky]

I haven’t watched ‘You’re On Sky Sports’ for a long time but I saw some of it last night.

Ray Parlour is the latest ex-pro to try his hand at punditry, and watching him blunder and bumble his way through the show last night was akin to watching a car crash. I felt quite sorry for him. Almost everything he said made no sense or was a cliché. He seemed a nice bloke but clearly that’s not enough. The best was this beauty…

Talking about Allardyce…

“At the end of the day, results pay the key.”

It’s not his fault though. Presumably Sky have some sort of interview/informal chat with prospective pundits? Why, then, do they always seem to pick the dim and inarticulate ones? I just don’t get it? Maybe these people speak well ‘off-camera’ and go to pieces on air…I don’t know.

I’d love to see Sky dump ex-pros and journalists, and just find some ‘regular joes’, football fanatics obviously, who can actually string a sentence together and speak well about the game. Maybe we could put forward some candidates? Silverfox?

What do you expect Shaggy, afterall...
It's Only Ray Parlour!!!!!!!!!!

[Matt]

Henry Winter would be a good pundit.