ESPN coverage

Having to rely on only the auditory sense helped confirmed something to me that we have long known; that Tommy Smyth gets to work as a football comments man is the sport's greatest injustice.

 

He was alongside Derek Rae for the 'Pool/Athletico game. He was able to offer absolutely nothing in terms of insight or analysis. All he could do is describe what he saw happening, but as to why it  actually happened, he offered nothing. As usual, he spent at least half of his on-air time talking about whether a particular player was offside, and most of the time (Robbie Keane's goal as an example) he is categorically wrong anyhow. That, to him, is "expert analysis".

 

Robbie Mustoe, on the other hand, was alongside Adrian Healy for the Chelsea/Roma match. he was full of insight into the game, one example being when he mentioned that as Bosingwa attacked down the right, Wayne Bridge was heading into an attacking position on the left, and that this was something that you would never have seen Chelsea fullbacks do under Jose Mourinho or Avram Grant.

 

This is one of the reasons that I watch televised football and listen to the commentary, to have some of the finer points detailed, points that I may miss due to my inexperience as a player at that level and my own tactical inadequacies. Tommy Smyth is incapable of this, therefore surely his position is redundant.

 

Why we put up with this I really don't know. It is very, very frustrating.

 

 

 

And a bad haircut. And he's chubby, whereas I'm just plain fat.