What is the role of the pundit in sport and are their views any better or more enlightening than those of Joe Public?
Many pundits fit the famous description applied to columnists as ‘Someone who hides in the hills during the battle and comes down to bayonet the wounded after it is all over’.
On a midweek radio show there was a very frank exchange of views between old and new school pundits, when former Manchester United player Michael Stewart and former Hearts assistant manager Billy Brown, went head-to-head on the subject of what punditry should involve.
So vehemently did they disagree that much of the heated debate which was recorded, wasn’t broadcast.
Michael’s tendency is a no-holds-barred assessment of what he sees on a football pitch while Billy is more sympathetic to those on the field.
Which of the two is right, or is there a middle road?
A pundit has to both inform and entertain, and in a world where information is freely available through mainstream and social media, the wool cannot be pulled over anyone’s eyes any longer.
Managers, coaches and competitors in all sports, usually take any form of criticism badly. There is an ‘old boys’ network which has traditionally been slow to criticise but very quick to make excuses for failings.
It’s understandable, because those pundits out of work want to work in the sport again and dare not criticise those who may be their next employer. Also, very often they are being asked to give an opinion on folk they have been friendly with for many years.
Those comfortable old days are gone though. In an information age no one has the monopoly on opinion or wisdom. Any pundit calling it wrong is instantly held to account on a variety of social media platforms where the Geneva Convention isn’t observed.
That has led to a harsher, more brutal world of opinion givers, where many of those paid to pontificate give no quarter to the combatants.
The good pundits in my book are those who call things as they see them, but also remind their audience of any caveats of injury, personal problems or consistency of team selection and such-like, which may have impacted on their subject.
In other words balance is the key to insightful punditry. Simply slaughtering a football player or manager, golfer or boxer, without a full understanding of the background as to why form has been lost, a shot missed or fitness lacking, is poor punditry.
A brutal character assasination or full frontal assault on the abilities of a sports star might make titillating TV, raucous radio or riveting reading, but does it paint the complete picture?
If it does, then the public will have been done a service, by gleaning information which they didn’t know. If it doesn’t then it does a disservice to the cause of transparency and truth, in the race for ratings.
The best pundits in my book are agenda free, open-minded and strong on facts. They are in a privileged position and the abuse of that is an abuse of power.