The Terrible Journalism & Tom English Thread

[Kyle Reese]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/61577131
 

Pretty accurate here, imo. 

[DA Baracus]

3 hours ago, Kyle Reese said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/61577131
 

Pretty accurate here, imo. 

Sycophantic, myopic pish.

[Kyle Reese]

2 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

Sycophantic, myopic pish.

Maybe we were concentrating on different parts. As a Dunfermline fan I am not sure which parts concerned you most in relation to your club. For me it was the parts that directly mention my team, our closest rivals and the Scotland national team, were where my focus was drawn. I found it pretty fair.

Which parts did you find sycophantic and/or short-sighted?

[DA Baracus]

18 minutes ago, Kyle Reese said:

Maybe we were concentrating on different parts. As a Dunfermline fan I am not sure which parts concerned you most in relation to your club. For me it was the parts that directly mention my team, our closest rivals and the Scotland national team, were where my focus was drawn. I found it pretty fair.

Which parts did you find sycophantic and/or short-sighted?

How much is devoted to Celtic anf Sevco.

[Kyle Reese]

7 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

How much is devoted to Celtic anf Sevco.

Sadly that is just the football in this country summed up though. It reflects the reality of the set up unfortunately.

[Jacksgranda]

I didn't think the Glasgow Derby pair coverage was too bad, tbf

[Kyle Reese]

19 minutes ago, Jacksgranda said:

I didn't think the Glasgow Derby pair coverage was too bad, tbf

It would have been a bit weird to have had a season review, and not mention the two clubs with the most fans, that finished first and second. Especially in a season where one of them reached the UEFA Cup final. I tend to just skim over the coverage of them these days, whilst accepting that it is something that is not going to change.

[Loominous]

I can't be bothered going into it all, but Tom English is so irritating. Just seems to love giving his opinion on things he apparently knows nothing about. I have to skip the parts of the podcast where he is speaking. 

Edited June 8, 2022 by Loominous

[johnnydun]

Welcome Gary who?

 

 

[DA Baracus]

6 hours ago, Loominous said:

I can't be bothered going into it all, but Tom English is so irritating. Just seems to love giving his opinion on things he apparently knows nothing about. I have to skip the parts of the podcast where he is speaking. 

It's his job to give his opinion though.

[Jacky1990]

18 hours ago, DA Baracus said:

It's his job to give his opinion though.

I think the problem him and many others have is that they regularly base their opinions on guesswork rather than on facts and evidence and then stubbornly try and defend that position when the facts/evidence dont agree with their opinion. Which is fine for a boy down the pub, but not for someone who is held up as a national authority on the game.

An example would be English and the likes defending Barry Ferguson and arguing that he is a good manager who just needs a better group of players. Despite all evidence pointing to Ferguson being hopeless.

[VincentGuerin]

On 18/05/2022 at 12:34, craigkillie said:

Rangers have probably beaten better teams than Celtic did in 1967 though. Celtic's entire run to that final consisted of Zurich, Nantes, Vojvodina Novi Sad and Dukla Prague.

--- Outs self as having no understanding of anything before modern football. Zero awareness that teams that were really good in the past are now, for many reasons, not very good ---

On 22/05/2022 at 16:34, Dundee Hibernian said:

Celtic actually winning rather than losing a final in Europe makes that a better achievement. As to their opponents:

Zurich were no mugs, having reached the European Cup semis two years previously.

Nantes had won the French league for the previous two seasons under the legendary José Arribas, famed for his speedy one touch football.

Vojvodina Novi Sad had fired 6 goals past the Spanish champions Atlético Madrid, including a win at the Vincent Calderón Stadium, in the round prior to Celtic beating them. 

Duala Prague scored 15 goals in their three ties, including defeating Anderlecht and Ajax before being knocked out by Celtic. 

I've got decent recall of the tournament that season, as a year long project on a subject of 'own choice' was demanded by my school, and the European Cup was my pick at the start of the 1966 term. 
 

---Comprehensively telt by someone who has in-depth knowledge of the topic ---

On 22/05/2022 at 16:41, craigkillie said:

It's a bit of a circular argument to claim the quality of the European Cup was high by using performances in the European Cup to justify it. It would be like me saying League 2 must be great because Kelty Hearts won it ahead of Annan and Forfar despite both of those teams having really good seasons in League 2.

---Absolutely bizarre digging in to position rather than just acknowledging that he'd gone a bit out of his depth on a subject he doesn't know anything about---

 

I have to say, as a piece of performance art this is an absolutely magnificent, and thoroughly fitting, example of posting on the Terrible Journalism thread. A gig on Sportsound must surely beckon.

Bravo.

Edited June 10, 2022 by VincentGuerin

[craigkillie]

What a bizarre little post. The European Cup in that era was dominated by sides from Spain, Italy and Portugal - indeed no club from any other nation had ever won it prior to Celtic, and only three clubs had even made the final (Reims x2, Eintracht Frankfurt and Partizan Belgrade). Celtic didn't have to face sides from any of those countries in their run to the final, which was the primary basis of my argument, as described in one of my later posts. Amazingly enough, I wasn't making my judgement based on how good the current Vojvodina Novi Sad and Dukla Prague sides were.

Doing a school project 55 years ago doesn't make another poster an expert on a bunch of teams he almost certainly never actually saw play - there's even an inaccuracy in the post which I ignored in my reply because it wasn't relevant to the actual discussion (Zurich had reached the European Cup semi-final three years previously, not two). The analogy I made remains valid - if my argument was that the standard of teams in the European Cup wasn't reflective of all the actual best teams in Europe, then trying to counter that to say that a team got to the semi-finals of the European Cup previously, or scored lots of goals in the European Cup, doesn't actually prove any sort of point. The swashbuckling Nantes team described in that post didn't even win the French league in 1966/67, and only won 17 of their 38 league matches in that campaign.

You have correctly pointed to the massively increased financial disparity in football in the intervening period, there are four leagues which now totally outstrip the rest financially, and the clubs from those nations are now able to hoard talent in a way that simply wasn't possible in the 1950s and 1960s. In the era being discussed, clubs predominantly picked players from their own nation, with the slight exception of the aforementioned Spanish, Italian and Portuguese sides who featured a number of foreign players (or players from overseas colonies in Benfica's case) in their trophy winning sides.

The four teams Celtic played on their way to the final barely featured any foreign players - the main exceptions were a 39 year-old Laszlo Kubala for Zurich and Yugoslav striker Vladimir Kovacevic for Nantes - and were therefore basically were limited to some of, but in most cases not even all of, the best players from a given country. That increased level of equality across the domestic leagues and the continent led to more balanced competition, but as Scottish Championship fans will very happily testify, competition and quality are two different things. It is very difficult to argue that the top teams in the big countries now are not far better than the top teams in those countries 50 years ago.

The argument being made wasn't "these teams were all shite", but simply that Rangers' opponents this year might be better. Given that these included two of the four best teams from one of the elite leagues in Europe, featuring some of the best players from across the world, I don't think that's exactly an outlandish thing to say. The financial imbalance in football makes it harder for a Scottish club to reach a European final nowadays (even in the secondary competition), in the same way that it's harder for clubs outside of Glasgow to win our league now.

Even if you still disagree with all of that or my previous posts, it's still not actually that well suited to a "Terrible Journalism" thread given that I'm not a journalist. On the whole then, a 2/10 contribution on your part.

Edited June 21, 2022 by craigkillie

[Dundee Hibernian]

1 hour ago, craigkillie said:

Doing a school project 55 years ago doesn't make another poster an expert on a bunch of teams he almost certainly never actually saw play - there's even an inaccuracy in the post which I ignored in my reply because it wasn't relevant to the actual discussion (Zurich had reached the European Cup semi-final three years previously, not two). 

......................................................................................................................................................................................................................

The argument being made wasn't "these teams were all shite", but simply that Rangers' opponents this year might be better. Given that these included two of the four best teams from one of the elite leagues in Europe, featuring some of the best players from across the world, I don't think that's exactly an outlandish thing to say. The financial imbalance in football makes it harder for a Scottish club to reach a European final nowadays (even in the secondary competition), in the same way that it's harder for clubs outside of Glasgow to win our league now.

 

I've selected these two parts of your post: I'm not an expert, neither are you. As you've corrected a point regarding an error of one year, I'll point out yours, as a quid pro quo: the project commenced 56 years ago, not 55. I only saw Celtic live from that bunch of teams. Of the Europa League sides of last season, I only saw one live. I'm doubting you saw many more than that. 

..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................

As for the evidence given of the Ibrox side facing harder opponents last season, Lyon pumped them. They last won their league 14 years ago, and finished 8th last season. Your reference to the the German sides on the surface may seem good, until you examine the priority these clubs placed on that tournament. Eintracht rested players prior to ties, Leipzig and Dortmund rested players for their European games. Entry to the Champions League takes precedence for them.

Eintracht Frankfurt finished in the bottom half of their table, it's hardly indicative of the competition having better sides than took part in the 1966-67 European Cup. 

[VincentGuerin]

2 hours ago, craigkillie said:

Even if you still disagree with all of that or my previous posts, it's still not actually that well suited to a "Terrible Journalism" thread given that I'm not a journalist. On the whole then, a 2/10 contribution on your part.

My praise for your contribution was more focused on its Sportsound-esque willingness to double down on exposed ignorance than on your profession, whatever that may be.

Your original contribution about the teams Celtic beat was silly and showed ignorance of the topic you were commenting on, and on reflection you could have just walked it back. Or maybe not. The 'logic' you've tried to employ since then is frankly bizarre.

As I said, marvelous performance art for this thread. I appreciated it.

[afc_blockhead]

47 minutes ago, VincentGuerin said:

My praise for your contribution was more focused on its Sportsound-esque willingness to double down on exposed ignorance than on your profession, whatever that may be.

Your original contribution about the teams Celtic beat was silly and showed ignorance of the topic you were commenting on, and on reflection you could have just walked it back. Or maybe not. The 'logic' you've tried to employ since then is frankly bizarre.

As I said, marvelous performance art for this thread. I appreciated it.

Spot on

This poster (craigkillie) posts with undeserved and unwarranted authority constantly. His profile picture may suggest a glimmer of self awareness as to how he comes across.

[G51]

Craig is right about this tbh. Celtic won the European Cup back in an era when professionalised football in Europe was basically in it's infancy. West Germany only formed a professional league in 1963. Sweden, Belgium, Denmark etc. were yet to develop one at all. To try and compare it to a European run in the modern era is daft.

 

[Raidernation]

Another threat becomes a bigot fest!

Just. f**k. Off.

ETA you c***s have your own sub-forum, just f**k off over there please

[craigkillie]

2 hours ago, Dundee Hibernian said:

I've selected these two parts of your post: I'm not an expert, neither are you. As you've corrected a point regarding an error of one year, I'll point out yours, as a quid pro quo: the project commenced 56 years ago, not 55. I only saw Celtic live from that bunch of teams. Of the Europa League sides of last season, I only saw one live. I'm doubting you saw many more than that. 

..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................

As for the evidence given of the Ibrox side facing harder opponents last season, Lyon pumped them. They last won their league 14 years ago, and finished 8th last season. Your reference to the the German sides on the surface may seem good, until you examine the priority these clubs placed on that tournament. Eintracht rested players prior to ties, Leipzig and Dortmund rested players for their European games. Entry to the Champions League takes precedence for them.

Eintracht Frankfurt finished in the bottom half of their table, it's hardly indicative of the competition having better sides than took part in the 1966-67 European Cup. 

To be very clear, I was only mentioning your post again because the other poster brought it up. We had a civil discussion and I didn't think any less of you for disagreeing with me.

[Ludo*1]

39 minutes ago, afc_blockhead said:

Spot on

This poster (craigkillie) posts with undeserved and unwarranted authority constantly. His profile picture may suggest a glimmer of self awareness as to how he comes across.

100% this. Condescending and arrogant constantly with very little reason for it.