Back before football was invented in 1992, it used to be regarded as a cliche for an ex-soccer player to open a pub. Nowadays, that would be quite the novelty. The mark of a flinty, single-minded contrarian.
Sky Sports has sparked a punditry boom and offers an endless stream of opportunities for ex-footballers. However, there are certain faux-pas which one must not commit if one is to integrate safely into his culture.
*This list consciously eschews the errors someone with the attitudes of a Ron Atkinson or a Rodney Marsh would make
When asked to name your favourite footballer of all time, you plump for someone other than Paul Scholes
If you are to instance your top 3 players and you don't include Paul Scholes, you will be written off as a troglodyte who has probably never kicked a ball in his life.
Remark that a player 'did well' rather than say he has 'done ever so well'
For whatever reason, the phrase 'he's done ever so well' has become bafflingly ubiquitous at the expense of the more economical 'he did well'.
Ask John Giles what relevance Don Revie and Billy Bremner have to Jose Mourinho and Nemanja Matic
The self-styled football intellectuals are inclined to roll their eyes whenever Giles references his playing days. Ex-players must not adopt this tone in his presence. Giles, it goes without saying, has forgotten more about football than anyone else will ever know. His analogies are always instructive.
Fail to laugh when Chris Kamara's reacts to something going on behind him
When Paul Merson and Charlie Nicholas and Jeff Stelling are falling around the place laughing and you just sit there silently, you'll bring down the mood in the Soccer Saturday studio. Play along.
Say that a club need a strong Director of Football to take the pressure off the manager
An alien opinion among old pros. If you say this in the RTE studio, then John Giles may resort to violence in a manner not witnessed since Kevin Keegan started annoying him at Wembley.
Use the straightforward past tense too much
Never say that someone 'should have scored there' when one could say 'he has got to be scoring from there'.
Failing to preface an in-game critique with the phrase 'For me'
When working as a co-commentator, one should preface every critique of a player's course of action with the phrase 'For me'. Takes the sting out of it slightly.
'For me, he's got to be hitting the target from there'
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