Graeme Souness

viv_andersons_nana said:
I love how so annoyed men are by the presence of women in and around football! It’s great.

“She’s a terrible pundit.” You hear this sort of thing said quite often. Have you ever heard Stephen Warnock or Jason Roberts or the hundreds of other terrible male pundits? Being a bad pundit isn’t exclusive to women.

What people seem to be saying is that they don’t want women anywhere near men’s football. Which just sounds a bit… well, weak. A bit pathetic. A bit precious. And if you don’t want women in men’s football, well just don’t watch it. But I have a sense that some of those moaning about ‘box ticking’ or whatever else are just been a little bit sexist but are too afraid to say women should be in the kitchen or putting the kids to bed.

The world is changing. You might have to start thinking about moderating or tweaking your language in certain situations, especially if you’re a big-name pundit on the weekend’s premier football broadcast. It’s not hard.
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I’m sorry mate but you are extrapolating far too much.

To me, I don’t care who does what as long as they are decent at it. A crap pundit is a crap pundit no matter sex, race etc. in this instance of a bloke talking about blokes playing a match and referring to it as a man’s game and being glad we have it back to being a ‘man’s game’ in the traditional sense of the phrase (physical robust etc) in the context of the sanitised version full of play acting, rolling around histrionics and cheating and overly picky refs, (which admirably doesn’t seem to happen in the womens game as much) there is absolutely nothing wrong in what was said. The mens game is the mens game, the womens is the womens; they are entirely separate entities in their own right and each with their own admirable merits. People who get all precious about that have no concept of reality or context.

The achievement of the women this summer for example was fantastic, I enjoyed it and celebrated it, but to hear the pundits banging on about it ending 56 years of hurt (like one of the players - Beth England iirc - trotted out on response to GS comments) for the English game is both inaccurate and unnecessary, because it didn’t end 56 years for the mens game and saying it did cheapens the womens achievement. I cannot believe we have gone so far up our own assess that we have lost sight of the fact that men and women sports are different (unless they compete directly against each other) and can be talked about as being separate.

They can be viewed as two separate entities and talked about as separate entities without all the hand ringing that goes on. It really isn’t that hard a concept to grasp.

Edit: if he’d made those comments about football being a man’s game after he’d just watched a womens game then he would have been incorrect to have done so and should then rightly be questioned. That’s context you see.
 
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El Guapo said:
I’m sorry mate but you are extrapolating far too much.

To me, I don’t care who does what as long as they are decent at it. A crap pundit is a crap pundit no matter sex, race etc. in this instance of a bloke talking about blokes playing a match and referring to it as a man’s game and being glad we have it back to being a ‘man’s game’ in the traditional sense of the phrase (physical robust etc) in the context of the sanitised version full of play acting, rolling around histrionics and cheating and overly picky refs, there is absolutely nothing wrong in what was said. The mens game is the mens game, the womens is the womens; they are entirely separate entities in their own right and each with their own admirable merits. People who get all precious about that have no concept of reality or context.

The achievement of the women this summer for example was fantastic, I enjoyed it and celebrated it, but to hear the pundits banging on about it ending 56 years of hurt (like one of the players trotted out on response to GS comments) for the English game is both inaccurate and unnecessary, because it didn’t end 56 years for the mens game and saying it did cheapens the womens achievement. I cannot believe we have gone so far up our own assess that we have lost sight of the fact that men and women sports are different (unless they compete directly against each other) and can be talked about as being separate.

They can be viewed as two separate entities and talked about as separate entities without all the hand ringing that goes on. It really isn’t that hard a concept to grasp.
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Fantastic post.
 
Two incidents from recent weeks come to mind. The first is from the European Championship final when Jill Scott got involved in a tussle with a German player before squaring up to her and calling her "a fecking pr*ck" right to her face. The other is from Chelsea/Spurs yesterday when some bloke pulled another bloke's hair. :rolleyes: You're right Graeme it's a man's game. :)

In the culture war I'm definitely a non-combatant. I'm sure that the issue will come up at the next Tory leadership hustings where either Liz or Rishi or possibly both will promise to ban women from the game until someone points out the Lionesses victory whereupon they will execute a swift U turn the following day.
 
F***ing hell, people need to get a grip!

It is a man's game. He was talking about men's football and using that phrase as a description of character and attitude.

Offended by everything some people. Absolute wet mops.
 
El Guapo said:
I’m sorry mate but you are extrapolating far too much.

To me, I don’t care who does what as long as they are decent at it. A crap pundit is a crap pundit no matter sex, race etc. in this instance of a bloke talking about blokes playing a match and referring to it as a man’s game and being glad we have it back to being a ‘man’s game’ in the traditional sense of the phrase (physical robust etc) in the context of the sanitised version full of play acting, rolling around histrionics and cheating and overly picky refs, (which admirably doesn’t seem to happen in the womens game as much) there is absolutely nothing wrong in what was said. The mens game is the mens game, the womens is the womens; they are entirely separate entities in their own right and each with their own admirable merits. People who get all precious about that have no concept of reality or context.

The achievement of the women this summer for example was fantastic, I enjoyed it and celebrated it, but to hear the pundits banging on about it ending 56 years of hurt (like one of the players - Beth England iirc - trotted out on response to GS comments) for the English game is both inaccurate and unnecessary, because it didn’t end 56 years for the mens game and saying it did cheapens the womens achievement. I cannot believe we have gone so far up our own assess that we have lost sight of the fact that men and women sports are different (unless they compete directly against each other) and can be talked about as being separate.

They can be viewed as two separate entities and talked about as separate entities without all the hand ringing that goes on. It really isn’t that hard a concept to grasp.

Edit: if he’d made those comments about football being a man’s game after he’d just watched a womens game then he would have been incorrect to have done so and should then rightly be questioned. That’s context you see.
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Best thing I’ve read on this forum for a while
 
Cardiffdaffs said:
Football was a man’s game when this was de rigeuer.

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Before my time but was it common for such a good player to be such a dirty b****d?

Some of those "tackles" were absolutely ludicrous, he'd be sent off every game doing that nowadays. Wonder if it was that aggression which bought him so much time, as players were **** scared to go anywhere near him?
 
Sky are horrendous for tokenism. Karen Carney got the pundit gig yesterday having never played a minute of premier league football.

Yet Sky have NEVER had a regular-ish male pundit doing Premier league games who has only played lower league. Why? Because they have never played in the premier league.

Stop it ffs.
 
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Andy_W said:
Before my time but was it common for such a good player to be such a dirty b****d?

Some of those "tackles" were absolutely ludicrous, he'd be sent off every game doing that nowadays. Wonder if it was that aggression which bought him so much time, as players were **** scared to go anywhere near him?
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Souness would have seen it as part and parcel of the gane and if you think rhat was unusual google the 1970 FA Cup Final replay Chelsea v Leeds full match and sit back and watch "the man's game" in full flow.
 
TheHolgate said:
Yet Sky have NEVER had a regular-ish male pundit doing Premier league games who has only played lower league. Why? Because they have never played in the premier league.
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Chris Kamara and Don Goodman didn't play many top flight games if any. But its a spurious argument anyway. How many failed managers comment on managemennt on tv these days. Just because you werent an exponent doesnt bar you from passing judgement in a TV role.
 
Alex-The-Kid said:
Nothing manly about assault, he should rightly be ashamed of some of that.
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Perhaps, but again, it all has to be taken in context. That is how the game was then and it is very different now. You cannot apply todays ‘rules’ to yesterday’s game. It is the same in the wider world, you cannot apply todays ‘enlightened’ philosophy, thought process, values and beliefs etc on yesterday’s less enlightened world/ people. The world evolves in all aspects but context still applies to everything.
 
Marvanelli said:
The problem is, it won't be long until we can't say those things.

Look at cricket with 'Batsmen'...can't say that anymore.

It's genuinely pathetic this is even a topic of discussion.
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Who said you can't say it any more?

Most still use batsman. I certainly do if referring to the men's game, batswoman for the women's game.
 
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