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

I must say it completely alienates me and I basically no longer watch punditry as a result.

There are excellent women pundits. In cricket, Isa Guha and Ebony Rainford Brent are both insightful and charismatic, and likewise Tanya Sachdev in chess. But so, so often they are vapid and dull, which is compounded by the fact that they often played the sport at a much lower level than that which they’re commentating on.

People say that men can be just as bad, and that’s certainly true. I can’t stand, for example, Rob Kearney. But at least he can be said to be one of the best players of his generation. He’s not very insightful but his reputation gives some interest to what he’s saying. But the women don’t have that, and so platitudes delivered in a monotone are just unacceptable. And, anyway, if they’re going to shake things up and push women on the viewer, the expectation should not be just that they match the worst male pundits.

I know many people will read this as sexist, but answer me why I am willing to watch hours of test cricket with women commentators, sometimes breathing a sigh of relief when they take over from male commentators I don’t like, if my issue with these pundits is their gender.

It’s disrespectful to the viewer to install inexperienced and uninteresting pundits purely on grounds of diversity and expect us not to notice.

How casually I’m accused of misogyny - a hatred of women.

I think we might have chanced upon the answer. Those defending the phenomenon are too stupid to assess the quality.

From male pundits I either want them to be insightful, bringing their years of experience playing the mens game to the table, or entertaining - winding others up, getting arguments going.

Female pundits all come from a level so much worse than the mens game it's beyond belief. Stephanie Roche is rolled out on RTE from time to time and if you dumped her at the peak of her career into the mens system, she'd settle probably at a level in the double figures in the English divisional system. She has no expertise on the mens game. She played at an absolutely terrible level, relative to Premier League level or Champions League level or Mens World Cup level.

And none of the female pundits are remotely entertaining. Just bland and boring. No expertise, no personality. Karen Carney another example. Just an absolutely dire pundit. Nothing intelligent to say, and nothing interesting or entertaining to say. No chemistry with the male pundits.

A pure box ticking exercise that diminishes the quality of the overall show. But the vocal types on twitter that would never watch the sports anyway love it, so of course it has to happen.

The perception of women in football will never be changed because it is a dramatically inferior level to the mens game. The best womens teams in the world are getting annihilated by under 14 boys teams. It's an atrocious standard.

Remember when you closed this thread:

"A girl in work was chatting to me at lunch about her idea that she'd like to see implemented, constituencies should have a minimum number of women candidates, ideally 50%. And a person's ballot paper won't be valid unless they select at least one woman, whether that's first or tenth or whatever preference.

I was amazed what she was coming out with. I hope such ideas are not mainstream. As a woman myself, I would not want to be elected as token candidate. Are quotas rubbish?"

I PM'd you about it, your response was "I have good reason. At the moment I can’t elaborate further."

Anytime anyone starts a thread that is even vaguely critical of women/their opinions it gets modded. This very thread has a mod warning for "blatant misogny" FFS.

Thinking again about this thread. There is a difference between presenters, who tend to be professionally trained broadcasters, and pundits, who tend to be ex players or current coaches, and who tend not to be trained broadcasters.

RTE punches above its weight in both areas. Athletics: Peter Collins, Sonia, Derval, Rob (Jerry Kieran RIP). Great team. Hard to find better on any channel,. Gender not relevant as it should be.

GAA. I think Joanne Cantwell is a fine broadcaster. Jacqui Hurley fine in both GAA and Rugby. Both professional broadcasters. Again, gender not relevant. Pundits: well pundits vary across both genders. I’d trust Fiona Coughlan to explain what goes on in a scrum to Shane Horgan (who I like) as Horgan has probably never in his life packed down. GAA, soccer, rugby. Good and bad, male or female. But if there is a choice of channel for a match or something like the Olympics I’d always opt for RTE.

The Beeb are good for no ads. Again, broadcasters like Gabby Logan, Hazel Irvine and Claire Balding or Sue Barker do a fine job. Soccer is a bit of a disaster. Can’t stand the ‘blokeiness’ of Lineker, Richards and Shearer, who really have zero insight. Just as bad on ITV. Can’t think of any good male or female pundit tbh. Have to agree with a previous poster that Roy Keane is a terrible pundit. Great fun to watch though and I have great time for his playing record and winning mentality. Female pundits new to the game. Give them time.

Sky and subscription channels. Soccer no thanks. Awful generally. They seem to believe soccer was invented when the Premier League started. Jeff Stelling apart, not worth the subscription fee.

Vigin media a strange one. Rugby ok, but they need to relax a bit. Get rid of the suits for one thing. I like Fiona Steed (Hayes). Soccer. Again ok. Brian Kerr is great in the studio but can’t stand him as a ci-commentator. Never shuts up. They don’t really cover other sports.

TG4 get a pass. Their remit is the promotion of the Irish language and I have no idea what their pundits are saying so they might be very insightful or useless. Sometimes, one of the guys standing there reminds me of the bus driver who’s put in goal in a Junior B match to make up the numbers. Also, that co-commentator is rugby drives me mad. Keeps talking when the ref is explaining a decision to the players. Awful stuff. Donal Lenihan is very good on RTE.

so, to conclude. I watch too much sport on TV. I’m off out for a run.

There are loads of journalists who never played a serious game in thereblife who comment and write on games. Not 1 poster on here who has said only people who played at a high level should be pundits have never said WHY. Dumpy never played at the highest levels

Johnny Giles is a much loved legend of Irish soccer but he may as well be giving his opinion on Badminton for the relevance of his experience to modern soccer. His opinion is still worth hearing.

I think the female pundits know they'll be held to a higher standard and generally I find they're well prepared, sometimes better than former male players.

Cow towing?