The ITV Crowd
By Mark Daniell
29/06/2010
Poor old ITV commentary team, they're really in a pickle at the moment. Not only did they miss out to the BBC on the England Germany showdown but now they're left competing with Andy Murray's march to the Wimbledon title. Credit to them however, on the one hand they don't have Alan Shearer, who's a bonafide ass, and on the other they are clutching at every straw they can to eke out a new reason to get excited. Howard Webb's having a good game isn't he? Oh yes, and his linesman has made some big calls, BIG calls, but I didn't want to mention it lest we jinx him. Really? Really Gerry? Has it come to this?
For a while now ITV has adopted a Risk board approach to geopolitics and bundled all the African nations together. Nigeria are out? Ah well, come on Cameroon, or even Ghana. In the land of ITV pretty much all African nations are interchangeable, all except for Algeria, they're muzzas. Obviously this isn't racist as ITV hold the same opinion about all nations who share a continent: New Zealand supports Australia, Brazil love Argentina and here in England, now that we're out, we'll be supporting the Germans. We're both blue after all.
Still, if they're not up to scratch with international affairs, at least Adrian Chiles knows what he's talking about when it comes to football. He's learnt everything there is to know about national sides and there's fun to be had in trying to watch him squeeze these preconceived stereotypes into the latest team performance. Yesterday Van Persie complained at being subbed off, as most strikers do when their team is in the ascendancy and they want to score. To Chilesy, this was a sign that in-fighting was bubbling beneath the surface in the Dutch camp. In his defence he's not the only one at it. Andy Townsend refuses to shake the belief that Brazil are all about samba soccer, the free-flowing attack-minded heirs to Pele, Jairzinho and Socrates. Look at the ingenious way the two centre backs stood in the box waiting for the corner, that's typical Brazil that, you can't mark that.
Townsy's having a great World Cup by the way, he's adopted the elder statesman role within the ITV punditry camp. First we'll hear what young Gareth Southgate has to offer, then contradict it with a little Marcel optimism, and Andy will clear up the confusion. The fact that Townsy doesn't have a clue what he's talking about is irrelevant. If he says David Villa is the best there is, then that's fact. Yes he missed a penalty, but it was only by inches. Classic Townsy.
My personal favourite is the idea that Messi's played badly unless he scores. It's all or nothing with commentators and Messi: either he's scored and he's the greatest player on the planet, perhaps ever; or he's not scored and he's been "anonymous". The BBC's Guy Mowbray (at least I think it was Guy Mowbray, I stop caring after a while) has watched Messi three times and never seen him play well. I don't know what the other two matches were, but in the third, which was against Mexico on Sunday, he was triple marked throughout yet still set up Tevez, afforded swathes of space for Higuain and saw his own effort tipped around the post. Did it go in? No? Anonymous. Meanwhile, in spite of Messi's tireless work and Tevez's awesome strike, the moment of the match goes to Gabriel Heinze.
Lastly I have a hunch we're in for some penalties today and it's nice to see FIFA has taken the time and consideration to request the vuvuzelas be silenced during a shoot-out. While the debate is out on the introduction of technology to football, it comes as a timely reminder of FIFA's regular ability to be all at once patronising, naive and plainly out of touch.