Football telly coverage winners and losers

Where we watch our football on TV is dominated by money and rights but we do get a mix with matches, highlights and football discussion on five different channels, but what are the pros and cons of each.

BBC
We don't get too much on the Beeb these days but we do have their World Cup coverage to look forward to. Nobody dramatises sport and create imagery through montages, music soundtracks and storylines better than the BBC. Gary Lineker is a good presenter although I do wonder that maybe he should be answering questions from the likes of Mark Lawrenson rather than asking them because he is a bigger name. Match of the Day is a classic and is the winner over Sky's Football First while Football Focus and MOTD2 offer that fun element. The Football League Show with Manish is good although there is too much going on in that studio and I think it's on a bit late so it's a good move putting it on all day on the red button. Their live coverage of occasional Football League matches is OK but I hate listening to Mark Bright as a pundit. Score is a poor copy of Sky's Soccer Saturday and it misses the fun element of Jeff Stelling's show. But you know we will have some first class coverage of the World Cup this summer.

Sky
People moan that everything is on Sky but it is important to remember that without them the league would not attract the best players, although some clubs may have been a bit more careful with their money in that case. Nevertheless the coverage is good. 24-hour sports news may seem a little over the top but I always watch it, so I shouldn't really moan. They have given us the chance to watch the league unfold more and more every year and now give us the new element with 3D (http://jamestoseland87.blogspot.com/2010/04/3d-football-coverage-not-quite-green.html). I love Soccer Saturday particularly because of the fun element to it and I recommend Jeff Stelling's book, it's a good fun read. Sky balance the unprecedented Premier League coverage with lots of Football League games which is good because it is the core of English football. I quite like Jamie Redknapp and he will help pull in the female viewers and Martin Tyler is one of the best in the business. I don't like Richard Keys and Andy Gray, they don't seem to have a good rapport for a pair that have worked together for 20 years and Keys still doesn't seem to have learned anything about football. Gray just bangs on about how the league is the best in the world and plays around with his touch screens. I do think that he has a slight Manchester United and Liverpool bias as well which is strange since he played for Everton. Their Champions League coverage is good, although I think they should mix their pundits around a bit, but it's better than ITV. Their Spanish football programmes are good with insightful news about a great league and although they only really show Barcelona and Real Madrid, that's all anyone really wants to see. Soccer AM is not what it used to be but Max Rushden and Hells Bells are good together and it still is a winning formula. Football First is no good because people don't want to see extended highlights and it is up against Match of the Day which has the history. You often hear Phil Thompson and co on Soccer Saturday saying: "You'll see it on Match of the - sorry of Football First later."

ITV
When ITV lost the Premiership highlights and they went back to MOTD it was a blessing because it was one less thing to watch on ITV. On occasions their coverage is a joke, just think of when they cut to an advert when Dan Gosling scored the winner for Everton against Liverpool in the cup. They always bang on about the romance of the FA Cup and try and dramatise it but like I said before, no-one does that better than the BBC. They are fronted by a big name in Steve Ryder but Matt Smith is a poor substitute and I think he would be better placed in a entertainment show than sport, he doesn't seem to know much about the game. They rarely get big names in on their punditry and the likes of Robbie Earle, Andy Townsend and Jim Beglin do not command respect and it's hard to take their points as gospel like you do with Alan Hansen. The commentary is not great and although they have a seasoned pro in Clive Tyldesley all he and the other commentators seem to do is say stat after stat and a lot of them are rubbish. I'm just waiting for: "This is the first time Manchester United have been 1-0 down in the first 37 minutes against a Portuguese team with a T in their name when it's raining."

ESPN
ESPN is a breath of fresh air from Setanta and it's coverage is good. Stubbsy and King Kev have a better rapport than Keys and Gray and Keegan is a better pundit than I expected. I never liked Jon Champion before but watching more of him he actually comes out with memorable quotes and good points. Often you pick up a newspaper and one of his lines is quoted to set the scene of a big game. "Nobody's perfect but some are more imperfect than others" was a favourite before the Chelsea Burnley game the day the John Terry scandal broke. I'm not too sure about Joe Royle and Craig Burley as summarisers however, again they don't command respect. Their Talk of the Terrace programme is quite good but it's a bit of copy of Soccer AM. They also show the Bundesliga and Serie A which gives us the chance to watch two great leagues.


Five
I don't see too much on Five these days because I only got interested in the Europa League from the quarter final stage but Guardian Fiver readers will know that I love Colin Murray and I'm looking forward to him hosting MOTD2. I love the fact that he is a football fan and wants to know what the fans want to know. Pat Nevin makes good points but I'm not too sure about his analysis in what looks like Andy Townsend's tactics truck. Stan the Man is also a better pundit than I expected but he carries baggage around with him from his past that means people don't really respect him. It's far cry from their old Cup Winners Cup coverage with Jonathan Pearce going absolutely mental, but I used to quite enjoy that.

The BBC are number one for me but they could learn some lessons from Sky on their Score programme. The main thing is they have pundits like Hansen and Shearer who you respect and listen to what they say. Sky rely too much on Gray and I get fed up with him, while I'm warming to King Kev on ESPN but I have no time for ITV and only watch it if it's the only place to watch a game.

JT