Female Pundits on Men's Sports *Mod warning in Post #42*

Who watches/listens to pundits?

I watch the game, and make up my own mind ....

It all depends on what they have to say.

There is no denying that a lot of male pundits offer nothing in the way of "analysis"

So it's the same for the females.

I believe there is one lady that has done analysis on Irish soccer games and she has put her male counterparts on the panel in the ha'penny place with her ability to analyze and articulate.

But even though it's common now to see female analysis, it's not that new.

The Sunday Game back in the 70s had a female analysts talking about hurling.

Sports punditry has well jumped the shark, who wants to listen to an hour or more of dour gobbly gook technobable. Bring back the craic, who cares about the sex of the presenters.

Being a female pundit must be one of the best jobs going. Safe in the knowledge that no matter how bad you are no one can ever say it because you can also just pull the sexism card. Are all male pundits good? No but they'll have to put up with that criticism as ''part of the job''

This trend that has exploded in the last two or three years leaves me baffled. To speak knowledgably of either womens or mens sports at any sort of decent level - surely you have to have played at that level in those competitions. I'm scratching my head when I hear a woman giving her expert opinion of what's going on in the scrum of an international mens rugby match - how could she possibly know? Most men wouldn't know even but at least some might. Likewise if I heard John Mullane giving his pearls of wisdom on a county camogie match - I'd be thinking what de f* does he know about camogie at a county level. But you don't hear John M as far as I recall talking about camogie.

I've no problem at all with men or women giving their opinions on any sports as in ordinary supporters. Not quite sure about TV hosts of sports shows, as they steer the inputs of the pundits but you can make an argument there that as long as they don't force their own opinions, it is fair enough.

It is a mixture regardess of gender some are excellent pundits - lisa fallon in the soccer is a particular standout. Aine Gallagher for hurling is very good on TG4. I find Noelle Healy informative and gives good insight on the football (GAA).

But there are others like many of the men who are terrible. Full of cliches and or talk in circles. There is a South African woman named Melissa Reedy who works for SKY. But she talks in circles and just waffles.

Like the OP once I got over the initial shock of wondering who the pundits were, as John Giles would say, I took them on their merits.

It's especially true with Gaelic games as men's and women's games are organised by separate distinct organisations. Women play different games with different rules.

Re: female pundits, some of them are good enough that its hard to dismiss them entirely whatever shortcomings or experience gap they may have.

Punditry in general isn't great. MOTD in particular is too "matey" imo. It is good for comedy double acts like Neville-Keane and Neville-Carragher.

I find some Italians like Pirlo and Ancelotti are capable of merciless, cold-eyed analysis.

After Pirlo scored his famous "trick-shot" chip penalty against England, he said afterwards that he knew the over-confidence of the English team was fake and that all he needed was to cut through it and their morale would collapse.

That is ice-cold and too astute for a waffly television show.

The female pundits on the English channels during the World Cup were an incredible level of boring.

I'm usually surprised at just how little some pundits know (or at least, how little they are able to express) about a sport they played at an elite level for so long.

Ronnie Whelan and Damien Duff being two examples.

Lisa Fallon seems to know far more about the game and understand it better than they do.

Maybe an hour before they go on air give then a massive feed of pints and coke that would liven things up. Love to see Keane after that.

Could we get women to do the VAR referees on football? After today's Spurs v Brighton match they couldn't do any worse.

There is a female commentator on match of the day, she just shouts all the time, its really irritating to listen to.

in general I'm not a fan of female pundits but its all pc these days so we are stuck with them. 😥

Neither of your Exhibits prove your point. The very narrow scheme for Professors is not illegal, and hasn't had any legal challenge since it came in.

The funding scheme doesn't give €50k extra for having a female lead.

If there was a huge historic imbalance in access to Professor posts, then I’d be perfectly fine with an appropriate positive action measure, given that positive action is explicitly permitted under equality legislation.

There is no “extra funding to projects with a female lead” as you claimed. There are funding schemes specifically for projects with female leads, which is a different scenario.

It’s fascinating to see the fragility of the downtrodden males in response to simple measures to address historic inequities though.

If you’re relying on Journal commentators to make your point for you, you might as well give up the ghost. How many of the Journal commentators were predicting that the State was certain to be sued for gender discrimination?

Vicky Sparks? If so, she is woeful.

Thats the one. how did she get that job? 🤨