- Aug 21, 2013
- 1,187
- 4,884
I think Sky's coverage of the last game at WHL has attracted criticism form a number of spurs fans. Mainly because of the following:
- Henry's presence
- Souness' 'this (whl) is not a place known for it's atmosphere' jibe
- Tyler's 'they've not seen much success here' comment just before kick off
- David Jones' constant questioning of 'can we keep our best players' or 'will Wembley move effect them'
- Jamie Redknapp errr....being Jamie Redknapp.
Some fans deny any sky bias. While there is a camp who vehemently believe sky hate us.
FWIW - I don't think sky executives hate us. I think we can all agree we're shown and discussed a sufficient number of times by them to not have a more valid gripe about being ignored like they do 80% of this league.
Therefore, our issue is not one of being ignored but more what is being said/debated by their pundits.
So why is it that spurs are often debated with a caveated negative slant? The obvious answer is that most their pundits are not only non-spurs, but ex pros with a deep seeded rivalry with spurs.
This is not deliberate by sky execs but a consequence of two factors.
1. Sky cater for the masses (globally)
The best support teams attract the most viewers = advertising and subscription revenue. We're a big club on these shores but globally we're a long way short of the established 'elite'. Liverpool have 7.3m twitter followers, Arsenal (9.8m) UTD (11.1m) compared to our 1.8m. If you looked at it from a pure cash perspective, which is what their execs would do, you'd cater to their fans over ours. What sky used to do was invite a current player, who unavailable through suspension or injury, to the studio for pre game but this player was so tightly gagged by the club, he’d offer nothing meaningful. Like any business, Sky would prefer to have a small group of employees who will be consistently used than a large base of ex pros which will be expensive to train and retain only be wheeled when their team plays. We may not see Redknapp (40 odd games in spurs shirt) as a spurs man but to sky, he'll do. He's also vanilla enough to comment on number of teams. The downside is that he offers little depth or insights to the majority of teams. This was badly exposed at the last game at WHL where David Jones was required to ask questions about the present and future of our club because quite simply, Jamie and co lacked the knowledge of our past. Yet how often will they be required to speak of a team’s history pre game?
2. Our lack of success
Sky's punditry team, with very few exceptions, is aimed at not only satisfying the elite sides but also having recognisable ex pros with big game experience so they can be marketable. Sadly, 30 odd years of failure from our club has resulted in very few credible pundits which meet the above criteria. If you notice, Chelsea have only just started getting a presence on their punditry panel because their 'illustrious' legends are now just retiring. If Spurs had a successful period like Chelsea and a version of Frank Lampard (articulate England international, PL/CL/EL/FA and league cup winner), Sky would have him. Fact is we don't. So we have to suck it up for at least a decade. In future, the likes of Kane, Walker, Rose, Alli would all be good pundits but we need to do our bit and be successful along the way.
- Henry's presence
- Souness' 'this (whl) is not a place known for it's atmosphere' jibe
- Tyler's 'they've not seen much success here' comment just before kick off
- David Jones' constant questioning of 'can we keep our best players' or 'will Wembley move effect them'
- Jamie Redknapp errr....being Jamie Redknapp.
Some fans deny any sky bias. While there is a camp who vehemently believe sky hate us.
FWIW - I don't think sky executives hate us. I think we can all agree we're shown and discussed a sufficient number of times by them to not have a more valid gripe about being ignored like they do 80% of this league.
Therefore, our issue is not one of being ignored but more what is being said/debated by their pundits.
So why is it that spurs are often debated with a caveated negative slant? The obvious answer is that most their pundits are not only non-spurs, but ex pros with a deep seeded rivalry with spurs.
This is not deliberate by sky execs but a consequence of two factors.
1. Sky cater for the masses (globally)
The best support teams attract the most viewers = advertising and subscription revenue. We're a big club on these shores but globally we're a long way short of the established 'elite'. Liverpool have 7.3m twitter followers, Arsenal (9.8m) UTD (11.1m) compared to our 1.8m. If you looked at it from a pure cash perspective, which is what their execs would do, you'd cater to their fans over ours. What sky used to do was invite a current player, who unavailable through suspension or injury, to the studio for pre game but this player was so tightly gagged by the club, he’d offer nothing meaningful. Like any business, Sky would prefer to have a small group of employees who will be consistently used than a large base of ex pros which will be expensive to train and retain only be wheeled when their team plays. We may not see Redknapp (40 odd games in spurs shirt) as a spurs man but to sky, he'll do. He's also vanilla enough to comment on number of teams. The downside is that he offers little depth or insights to the majority of teams. This was badly exposed at the last game at WHL where David Jones was required to ask questions about the present and future of our club because quite simply, Jamie and co lacked the knowledge of our past. Yet how often will they be required to speak of a team’s history pre game?
2. Our lack of success
Sky's punditry team, with very few exceptions, is aimed at not only satisfying the elite sides but also having recognisable ex pros with big game experience so they can be marketable. Sadly, 30 odd years of failure from our club has resulted in very few credible pundits which meet the above criteria. If you notice, Chelsea have only just started getting a presence on their punditry panel because their 'illustrious' legends are now just retiring. If Spurs had a successful period like Chelsea and a version of Frank Lampard (articulate England international, PL/CL/EL/FA and league cup winner), Sky would have him. Fact is we don't. So we have to suck it up for at least a decade. In future, the likes of Kane, Walker, Rose, Alli would all be good pundits but we need to do our bit and be successful along the way.