Originally Posted by
sonofstan
Think most of us are so used -with justice - to dissing RTE that we automatically think anyone else will do a better job, and I just don't think that was true tonight - far too much of the commentary was of the peasant in the big city 'shucks look at us, playing with the big boys' variety, which wasn't at all warranted; add to that the ignorance on the part of commentators and presenters about the Derry team, and I think it was pretty sub- standard. RTE at least would have had Felix Healy or Dolan or even, god help us, Roddy as co- commentator who would have had some insight. what i think it illustrated was the IL attitude; the 'Europe alright for a lark, but not really for the likes of us' and 'look at these mad Derry people, aren't they mad?', rather than watching a good, committed football team handle technically better opposition pretty damn well.
I know Kenny and his team will be really disappointed if they go out of the competition - they won't be doing the 'sure wasn't it a great experience?' poor mouth routine. Irish football needs to stop wanting fairytales and start wanting hard work leading to earned success, and an informed and committed media should be part of that, not selling this kind of night as some cinderella thing, where poor little Paddy team gets to dress up for the night, as long as they remember they have to be back in their lowly place by midnight, and leave real competitions to the big Irish teams like Celtic and Man U.