to be fair to Channel 5 they're trying to give the show a bigger audience by putting it on at 9, so making it more accessible then the Beeb did, who have dialled in the last 3 years of the contract. I suspect the show won't look the same after the international break, they'll learn, and it'll improve.
Thought the direction was all over he place making it annoyingly disjointed but they did try to give the lower leagues more coverage. Both presenters are very good on 5 Live but the infuriating trend of having people pottering around in front of Top Gear-like planks in the studio scuppered any chance of decent dialogue. Just sit down and present what we really want to see - the format doesn't need zapping up. Kelly Cates is usually balanced and quite knowledgeable, and George Riley is natural and amusing but neither was given a chance to shine. Keep the presenters, dump the set.
Hmmm - I don't buy this "trying to make it more accessible" stuff. People are either into or can put up with the football, or they'll watch something else. If you're just flicking through looking for something to settle your eyes on for a bit, a load of pillocks standing around in replica tops leering at the presenter (a couple of hours under studio lights and the smells might have been a bit lurid) will make you scurry off to the subtitled Latvian crime drama on BBC4.
If you're trying to draw a wider audience in, then you'd have a someone from outside football as a guest. ("So, Gemma, tell us about your first Charlton match...") Get a band in, even.
But a load of tools milling around in their whiffy old replica kit? As others have said, it just plays to the whole "oh, the Football League doesn't matter, it's just the trivial bit beneath what the big boys do". The BBC fell for it too - the title card for the Football League Show had Manish looking sheepish with some mascots. That's not accessible, it's lazy.
I guess they'll have to shake it up as the weeks go on. But I do wonder if three divisions' worth of highights on a Saturday night is too much to swallow on a mainstream network, especially when you've the shadow of MOTD to avoid. Do a Championship show on a Saturday and L1/L2 on the Sunday? The Football League would hate it, but it might make for better telly.
The advantages you have in making a better programme than MOTD are clear. You have matches from all divisions for a start. And most of those are well enough filmed to show extended highlights if the actual entertainment warrants it. So pick the main games after they finish, not before. Take it division by division but maybe start with league 2 as a build up to the championship. Get a controversial opinionated pundit who has something to say that hasn’t been said a hundred times by others sitting alongside a less controversial one. The big theme of the first day has to be what is it telling us about the season ahead for all divisions. Maybe rather than having all the fans randomly chipping in, have a few you poll after every game so you could show the answer to a question like, are you more optimistic after today’s game about the season. Then you might want to interview say a QPR fan having a whinge for a couple of minutes – better to hear the moaners than a Sheffield Wednesday fan telling us they will win the league lol. Maybe make a feature of predicting the next games and have a table going and come back to it briefly the following weeks. That would make a better show IMO.
my accessibility point was around time, not the quality of the content, or how its presented, being shoved on BBC1 at gone midnight was a ball ache for the old show.
The Premier League highlights thing is easy, games are edited as live on the day, have proper coverage, and only 6 maximum most Saturdays. The FL show will always struggle with 20+games, of varying quality of production and having to edit those down in 3 hours to produce a show is going to be hard. If you want FL goals, watch Sky Sports News from 8, because I can't see a better way of doing it, unless the show is 2 hours on a Sunday.
Tape it, skip the ads and the 'banter' between highlights - job done in time for MOTD ^this^ the standing around "zoo" format shamelessly lifted off that satellite channel owned by the despicable M"rd0(h and it was sh!t there too even with much bigger production values The presenters are ok, especially given the dead dog they've been landed with but the 'ex-pro' makes Steve Claridge sound like Steven Fry. A mate of mine complained vehemently about showing the divisions out of sequence but that is one part Channel5 got right - if they showed it Champ, 1, 2 the viewing figures would evaporate after half an hour and with it their advertising revenue, virtually all of us will ffwd thru to 'our bit' but our PVR or 'satellite plus' box will have 'watched' the whole programme and the advertisers have to cough up. If we're regularly restricted to 40 odd seconds at the end I'll soon resort to the minute and three quarters on youtube which the OS often links to.
Tape it, skip the ads and the 'banter' between highlights - job done in time for MOTD ^this^ the standing around "zoo" format shamelessly lifted off that satellite channel owned by the despicable M"rd0(h and it was sh!t there too even with much bigger production values The presenters are ok, especially given the dead dog they've been landed with but the 'ex-pro' makes Steve Claridge sound like Steven Fry. A mate of mine complained vehemently about showing the divisions out of sequence but that is one part Channel5 got right - if they showed it Champ, 1, 2 the viewing figures would evaporate after half an hour and with it their advertising revenue, virtually all of us will ffwd thru to 'our bit' but our PVR or 'satellite plus' box will have 'watched' the whole programme and the advertisers have to cough up. If we're regularly restricted to 40 odd seconds at the end I'll soon resort to the minute and three quarters on youtube which the OS often links to.
Show league 2 first, then league 1, championship last. As long as it's in some sort of order.
To be honest, I wouldn't mind if they showed the goals slightly out of order. Start the show with extended highlights of the best game from each division - not the one between the biggest teams, but with the most goals and controversial incidents. Then revert to the all the goals from each division format, that way every club has their chance at a moment of glory, and the channel has a way of making sure that people stay tuned in for longer.
They repeated a Simpsons today which had a line in it that reminded me of the "Top Gear" style format- "Who do you want me to talk to, the man dressed in a bumble-bee costume or the one with a bone in his hair?"
Personally I like to see all the other goals as I like to see what all our old ex players are up to.
On the positive side, 5 have made worse programmes. That game show with Keith Chegwin in the buff or Rebecca Loos tugging off a pig. I'm sure next week will be better.
Ah yes but the Loos show was also had the fantastic moment when Vanilla Ice tried to pick on Stan Collymore after picking on Paul Daniels and Terry Christian and Stan said to him "anytime you want I will take you outside and cave your f***ing head in"
Thought the direction was all over he place making it annoyingly disjointed but they did try to give the lower leagues more coverage. Both presenters are very good on 5 Live but the infuriating trend of having people pottering around in front of Top Gear-like planks in the studio scuppered any chance of decent dialogue. Just sit down and present what we really want to see - the format doesn't need zapping up. Kelly Cates is usually balanced and quite knowledgeable, and George Riley is natural and amusing but neither was given a chance to shine. Keep the presenters, dump the set.
Totally agree - I like George Riley on 5 live (had no idea how he looked -thought he sounds a lot older on radio) and Kelly Cates is good on 6-0-6 and carries on giving good analysis despite Ian Wright keep calling her 'Kells'
Sorted some old photos and came across this ex player taken at Sheppey United,s ground during a charity match.Does any one know who it is please,it could be an ex Spurs player.
Sorted some old photos and came across this ex player taken at Sheppey United,s ground during a charity match.Does any one know who it is please,it could be an ex Spurs player.
Are Channel 5 editing which threads things get posted to on here as well?
Channel 5's attempt at the football league is even starting to mess with lifers. Bewildered by too much focus on the city of Sheffield and inane insight from ex football league superstar Adam Virgo, @Derek1952 is trying to start new discussions in existing threads. This is basically some sort of disease that they have set off that could be worse than the black plague
Comments
Tape it, skip the ads and the 'banter' between highlights - job done in time for MOTD.
If you're trying to draw a wider audience in, then you'd have a someone from outside football as a guest. ("So, Gemma, tell us about your first Charlton match...") Get a band in, even.
But a load of tools milling around in their whiffy old replica kit? As others have said, it just plays to the whole "oh, the Football League doesn't matter, it's just the trivial bit beneath what the big boys do". The BBC fell for it too - the title card for the Football League Show had Manish looking sheepish with some mascots. That's not accessible, it's lazy.
I guess they'll have to shake it up as the weeks go on. But I do wonder if three divisions' worth of highights on a Saturday night is too much to swallow on a mainstream network, especially when you've the shadow of MOTD to avoid. Do a Championship show on a Saturday and L1/L2 on the Sunday? The Football League would hate it, but it might make for better telly.
The Premier League highlights thing is easy, games are edited as live on the day, have proper coverage, and only 6 maximum most Saturdays. The FL show will always struggle with 20+games, of varying quality of production and having to edit those down in 3 hours to produce a show is going to be hard. If you want FL goals, watch Sky Sports News from 8, because I can't see a better way of doing it, unless the show is 2 hours on a Sunday.
^this^
the standing around "zoo" format shamelessly lifted off that satellite channel owned by the despicable M"rd0(h and it was sh!t there too even with much bigger production values
The presenters are ok, especially given the dead dog they've been landed with but the 'ex-pro' makes Steve Claridge sound like Steven Fry.
A mate of mine complained vehemently about showing the divisions out of sequence but that is one part Channel5 got right - if they showed it Champ, 1, 2 the viewing figures would evaporate after half an hour and with it their advertising revenue, virtually all of us will ffwd thru to 'our bit' but our PVR or 'satellite plus' box will have 'watched' the whole programme and the advertisers have to cough up.
If we're regularly restricted to 40 odd seconds at the end I'll soon resort to the minute and three quarters on youtube which the OS often links to.
1.5 hour programme - 9 games - 6 Championship, 2 League One, 1 League Two. Ten minutes per game. The goals of all the other games can go to hell.
When I watch I want to get a feel of the game. Just watching loads of goals going in means nothing to me.
Personally I like to see all the other goals as I like to see what all our old ex players are up to.