My message to TNT, Real-Bayern not all about Bellingham vs Kane – tone down the ‘Englishness’
For TNT Sport, Real Madrid vs Bayern Munich was all about Jude Bellingham against Harry Kane – AP/Christian Bruna
A history lesson for TNT Sports ahead of the Champions League semi-finals second leg. Twenty three years ago, Arsenal brought in Japanese international Junichi Inamoto on loan from Gamba Osaka. His, it transpired, was not a significant contribution to Arsenal’s cause. In a double-winning season he made just four appearances in total, none in the Premier League. But that did not stop a couple of dozen Japanese reporters following his every move, turning up at the Emirates to study him intently as he sat on the bench, urgently quizzing manager Arsène Wenger about his performance chances. So regular and insistent were the inquiries, Wenger began to tease his inquisitors.
“I expect you’re going to ask me if Inamoto will be playing in the next game,” he said at the end of one of his weekly press conferences. At which a dozen sets of fingers were poised above their keyboards in excitement. “I have an answer for you: maybe.”
If you deviate too often from the main talking point, people tend to stop taking you seriously. And if you want an idea of what it must have been like to be back in Tokyo reading match reports of Arsenal games in those days, when the focus was solely on one player entirely peripheral to the history being made around him yet who shared a nationality with the readership, then all you had to do was tune in to TNT’s coverage of the first Champions League semi-final last Tuesday. This was the most significant fixture of the European season thus far reduced in its scope and meaning to the Englishness of two of the participants. As the reporter Laura Woods put it: “It’s Bayern Munich and Harry Kane against Real Madrid and Jude Bellingham.”
True, Kane and Bellingham have been rather more central to the progress of their sides than Inamoto ever was for Arsenal. But even so, the unyielding focus on the home duo stalled investigation of the many other intriguing strands in this encounter: the confrontation of two wily old managers, whether for both clubs previous achievement was a spur or a drag, or, if you wanted a tale of an individual, what about the former Bayern favourite Toni Kroos returning home in rival colours? But no, this was the Jude against Harry show. And nothing else apparently mattered. TNT would be wise to remember this when they show the second leg this Wednesday.
Toni Kroos (right) playing against his former club was another big storyline – Getty Images/Alexander Hassenstein
But then it was not hard to sympathise with TNT’s editorial stance. The company had paid millions for Champions League rights, an investment anticipating that the latter stages would retain English club interest. This match could have been Arsenal against Manchester City, with all that would mean for ratings and advertising yield. To make this a narrative that would retain the eyeballs, attention was thus focussed on the involvement of the two who will spearhead Gareth Southgate’s assault on the Euros (with the occasional nod to the third Englishman playing, Eric Dier). Indeed, the conversation between the two studio-based pundits – Glenn Hoddle and Michael Owen, in truth not a pairing to wake the neighbours – might well have been an unintended restaging of the chat around the TNT boardroom.
“Bit of a downer not having any English teams in there,” said Hoddle.
“But the two star players in both teams are English,” came back Owen with hasty reassurance that this was not to be an evening devoid of interest for the home audience.
To reinforce the message delivered by the lads in the studio, out on the touchline were another pair of Englishmen who, like Bellingham and Kane, had been in opposition in a previous Bayern v Madrid Champions League game. There were Owen Hargreaves and Steve McManaman to tell each other how big this encounter was.
“This is big,” said McManaman.
“It doesn’t get bigger,” agreed Hargreaves.
And so the bigness continued.
“A big psychological advantage,” said McManaman from the co-commentary position as Madrid took the lead, disappointingly from the broadcaster’s perspective, through a goal that bypassed the English participants, Vinicius Junior latching on to Kroos’ majestic pass.
There was, with Madrid leading at the break, “a big half coming up” for Bayern, McManaman reckoned. Indeed it was. First they equalised, and then came what TNT had been waiting for: a Bayern penalty. Kane took it, with Bellingham injecting a bit of gamesmanship into things (watch video below). It was, inevitably, “a big moment”. An all-English moment at that. Well, apart from Madrid’s Ukrainian goalkeeper.
After Kane scored there were, the match commentator Darren Fletcher suggested, “17 big minutes to go”. And then Madrid equalised. “They find a way, they always find a way,” said McManaman, after his old team got back in it. “We should trademark that,” he added, pleased with his verbal dexterity. I’m not sure you can trademark cliches, Steve. But it was a nice thought.
And with it came a glimpse of a possible future. In 20 years’ time, when Bayern and Madrid meet yet again in the Champions League semi-final, TNT could employ Kane and Bellingham as their pundits, to tell us all what it is like to be Englishmen in a foreign land. Now that really would be big.
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