THE GOOD thing about having a car park pass at the Riverside is that you can avoid the crush in the underpass. The bad thing is that you are compelled to listen to far more of the 'Simply Red' post-match moan-in than can possibly be good for you as you sit waiting to inch out on to the A66 .
"Just turn it off", my wife snaps as I growl at the radio, make disparaging remarks about the intellect and integrity of some of the callers and snort with derision as Bernie Slaven explains his decision no' to name a man of the match yet again. After refusing to hand it over so often in the past few years the bequiffed fence-climber must have a bigger stock pile of bubbly than a Ascot hospitality tent on Ladies Day.
Sometimes I wish I had a Jeriboam to hand to smash the radio into a thousand pieces as yet another blinkered boo boy expounds the bleakest of world views and condemn's our heroes out of hand - then admits he wasn't even at the match. "But it sounded terrible Bernie."
And you are compelled to listen. Or I am anyway. It is a combination of morbid curiousity at the wireless freak show and an obsessional desire to hear, see and read every single bit of media coverage about Boro, even if it is garbage. I think that goes back to pre-Sky days when you had spend hours scouring the papers in WHS to find one paragraph of news.
The football phone-in is a peculiar institution and one that while soaring in popularity seems to be in a marked decline in content. They represent the triumph of quantity over quality.
When they started a decade ago they were guerilla shows broadcast by the articulate element informed by fanzine passion and politics and hosted by astute fellow fans who knew how to press the right buttons - metaphorically as well as literally - to generate insight and humour. Obviously Danny Baker was the the king of this and his 606 show reflected exactly the kind of debates that were taking place among supporters. It was a dialogue that produced illumination and a lot of laughs. More than Pets Win Prizes and his work with Chris Evans, that's for sure.
But the radio bosses soon released that football chat was cheap and easy. It was about the same time that the commanding heights of the media were captured by the flawed notion that the public were stupid and would swallow any old dross provided it was fronted by a celebrity. Football fans in particular were considered to be gullible in this respect and 606 collapsed under the collective obnoxious arrogance, inability to engage and general stupidity of David Mellor, Ricard Littlejohn, "Lofty from East Enders" and DJ Spoony.
Along with the dumbing down came the glamourocentric obsession with the Big three, or four or five or whatever thee tabloid story was this week. It became dominated not by issues and observations but bums on seats. Forget Hartlepool's monkey and Carlisle's crisis, let's talk about Beckham.
This trend was aided and abetted by the proliferation of mobile phones. Quickly the focus switched from those who had something to say to those who had the means to say it. And instead of asking the callers to set the agenda with interesting or quirky observations soon they were asked to respond to an "incident" being highlghted in the tabloids that the host had a better view of on his studio monitors than the poor sap on the coach on the way back from watching the game from a restricted view away end seat did.
Now the media has been fragmented and democratised every idiot can have a go. From think tank to gutter press vox pop . Which brings us to TalkSport. Radio White Van Man is the ultimate in banal fact-lite aural chewing gum.
Locally the trends have been similar, although they are mitigated by the fact that there are only three teams of roughly equal historical status and demographic profile and a relatively well informed audience who know the history and weak points of their neighbours. After a good win, or a rivals' heavy defeat, or a sacking or sending off or chief executive caught out slating the customers ina knocking shop The Three Legends is unmissable.
But at times it can be predictable, grating and stupifyingly dull and some nights it gets through the entire two hours without a single pertinent point being made either by callers or the trio of giggly schoolboys in the studio. There have been nights I yearned for the intellectual content of the Christmas Carol special editions.
When it was exclusively a Boro phone-in it was essential listening. Not in some parochial way because it excluded Geordies or Mackems but rather because it did not attract those only wanting to make cheap jibes at the opposition and because it allowed long, intense, closely argued debate to unfold. It was a genuine platform for discussion on the big Boro issues of the day.
That is what is missing now but when you promote banter you will ineviably attract the blinkered, the barmy and the bitter and lose the more detailed observations .They are all now being made on the fans message boards instead.
The Three Legends at times has been brilliant entertainment combining lively banter with some excellent analysis and humour and the Q&A sessions with Steve Gibson and Keith Lamb this season were fantastic.
But, and there's always a but, the after match show can be bloody awful. It is dominated by people who have not seen the match (the Football First and Match of the Day highlights aren't on for hours yet) but who keep their phone in a holster on their armchair with Century on speed dial.
They are working in the grey limbo between their own preconceptions and second hand information but they don't let that stop them. In essence, they have nothing to offer but their own subjective emotional response to a result they can't pad out with any evidence whatsoever. I can't wait to get out of the car.
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