After some jovial banter and brief discussion on twitter last week with several of this country’s leading football journalists, OLASAL decided to be bold and ask if they’d be brave enough to do a Q&A session with VitalChelsea.
One man was forthcoming, Neil Ashton of the Daily Mail and formerly of the now-defunct News of the World. Neil has responded to our questions below and those posed by numerous Chelsea fans on twitter also, talking about everything ranging from the media’s bias against the Blues to general newspaper standards and his favourite ever player.
Neil has spoken at length in the past about his belief that journalists should be transparent and accountable and his enthusiam and cooperation in taking part is a credit to him.
It is with enormous gratitude and alleviated respect for Neil that we run this piece today. The gauntlet has been thrown down to others in the industry now too – you know where we are if you’re brave enough.
Neil, you’ve been a professional sports journalist for some years now. What’s the biggest change in football and the way you write about it?
Certainly the demand and the thirst for news has never been greater and sometimes I do wish the phrase used in rolling TV newsrooms such as Sky Sports News – ‘never wrong for long’ – could apply to newspapers.
There is nothing worse than the stomach-churning feeling when a story which has been thoroughly researched and checked with the appropriate bodies is unexpectedly in dispute.
To give you an example, I wrote in last Saturday’s Daily Mail that the FA had asked Sky for the footage from every recorded camera angle of the John Terry incident at Loftus Road. The following Wednesday Barney Francis, the managing director of Sky Sports, was at a Sports Industry Breakfast in London and claimed that the FA had not asked for the tapes.
Quick as a flash the Daily Telegraph’s Paul Kelso tweeted Barney’s comments, prompting tweets to me from Chelsea fans with the predictable hashtags #lazyjournalist etc.
Later that afternoon Sky retracted the comments and confirmed that the tapes had in fact been sent to the FA and the Met Police. It should feel like a triumph and vindication, but actually it comes at a huge emotional cost.
Who is the greatest player in football history?
I would argue Zinedine Zidane, but sadly I suspect the answer is really Maradona.
I loved Zizou’s poise, his ‘roulette’ trick and that ability to change the pace of a game at his discretion. He left me breathless and he remains the best footballer I have been privileged to watch in person. In the same way as Messi, he dedicated his life to mastering his art. I wish a lot of players had the same desire.
If I’m allowed to stretch my imagination for the benefit of my long-term relationship with Chelsea fans I’d say Mickey Droy – he saved Palace from relegation when he arrived on a free transfer in the 1984/85 season.
As a Palace fan what is your fondest memory of the Premier League (if any)?
Can I bend the rules a bit? Thanks. Finishing third in the First Division in 1990/91 was a remarkable achievement (we also beat Chelsea on a giddy night at Selhurst Park early in the season when Andy Gray and Dennis Wise were sent off, and Ian Wright scored a beaut over, I think, Dave Beasant). It will be a while before Stevie Coppell’s, sorry Dougie Freedman’s, red and blue army are back there.
Paul Hayward in the Guardian has been amongst the first of the mainstream professional writers to come out and say he thinks AVB is not up to the job at Chelsea, and that ‘you can smell the fear coming off him’. What’s your take on our new manager?
Outwardly he has supreme self-belief, but internally I’m not so sure. He inherited a team in decline and although he remains committed to his attacking principles, he will need to refine his ideas if he expects the existing squad to respond. He can have all the flow charts, sharp suits and support from the top, but the bottom line is always the same: results.
What about his denial of your dressing-down story at Cobham?
It’s rare for players to break ranks when all is well in the dressing room and the team is winning. Managers are always upset when dressing room stories leak out and the story demonstrated that the bond between Villas-Boas and the players, plus the unshakeable belief he is attempting to engineer, is still in development.
He could have handled it better, perhaps by saying ‘I don’t discuss dressing room matters publicly’, but it’s his choice. I’m not going to get upset about something like that and neither should he.
It’s safe to say that Chelsea fans and your employer publication have often been on separate pages if you’ll pardon the pun. Do you think there is an undercurrent in the media of a dislike for Chelsea?
I loved watching Chelsea when Zola ruled, but the moment Roman Abramovich bought the club, some of the people he went on to employ behaved as if they themselves were worth £10bn.
They changed the culture of a brilliant football club overnight, making bold and embarrassing statements that they mistakenly believed reflected the mentality of the person who now owns the club.
Memorable quotes, such as ‘we’ll be a great club when we’ve won two European Cups’ or ‘two-thirds of the world is blue, our aim is to make the rest of it blue’ provoked widespread contempt and mirth among the worldwide media.
Credit to Steve Atkins and Gareth Mills in the club’s PR department, they have worked incredibly hard to repair a lot of the damage and they deserve recognition for that, but I doubt they can change the entire culture of the club.
It’s often bemoaned that the editorial standards in the newspapers and live media generally, not just regarding Chelsea, is awful, particularly in regards to the gross overuse of hyperbole, daft sensationalism and a need to dumb everything to tabloid standards.
I fully recognise the power and the might of the media, especially newspapers, and for that reason I believe journalists should be challenged about the stories they print and certainly placed under more scrutiny.
After the closure of the News of the World I felt that it was a huge moment for the industry, an opportunity for Fleet Street to establish better, more professional working practices.
The PCC guidelines are in place, but I also work to my own code of conduct that I continue to refine: ‘Are the practices I use morally and socially acceptable?’.
Newspapers have the ability to temporarily disrupt (typically the readers would prefer to use the word ‘destroy’) the lives of people in the public and we have to be prepared for people to challenge it.
I actually encourage and promote healthy discussion, which is why I admire Gigi Salmon and the production team on Chelsea TV’s PaperView. It seems to be the only platform in this country where football journalists are routinely challenged about their stories and I suspect the people who watch it have a grudging admiration for them (well, maybe.).
There have been some murmurings recently that the Champions League is doomed in its current format and that we are destined for a European Super League. What do you think of this?
The competition will continue to evolve, but the likelihood is that the long-term pressure will come from the money-men in the United States and the Middle East.
There will probably come a time when New York Red Bulls want a slice of the action and it’s hard to believe New York Cosmos will just settle for life in the MLS once they are properly up and running. They are already a worldwide brand and they don’t even have a team, but I’d welcome the inclusion of new teams in a newly-formatted competition as part of the new world order.
You seemed to keep out of the big CPO issue at Chelsea recently. What’s your take on that and the role that fans do/should play in the running of football clubs?
I was involved in other projects at the time, but I admired the fantastic work of the Independent’s Sam Wallace during that period. Before anyone accuses this of being a love-in I’m going to declare an interest because Sam’s one of my best pals.
Sadly for me he was one step ahead of the game on that story and his work on the CPO was first class and represented a significant shift towards the return of old-fashioned, weighty journalistic values, something which I aspire to myself.
In terms of the vote, I’m delighted for Chelsea supporters. I’m a bit of a traditionalist and I get all giddy whenever there’s a hint of nostalgia in the air – I don’t think many current Chelsea employees would even have the first idea about the battles with Marler and Cabra Estates, crowds of 8,000 and the team that survived relegation in the Eighties.
In modern business terms, it was an outrageous attempt by the owner to acquire prime real estate worth in the region of £300-400m for £1.2m. I don’t blame him for trying, but people of his wealth often misread the word on the street.
Do you think your average football fan is being priced out of the modern-day game, and does that worry you if so?
Chelsea cannot apply a means test to their supporters, they price their matches at a rate they believe is acceptable in the current financial climate.
It is a difficult balancing act and I do have sympathy for anyone who cannot afford to watch their team regularly, but the tariff for ticket prices has always been high, whatever the era.
It would be wonderful to think that the Premier League, FA and Premier League clubs especially could embrace their community and set aside tickets for each game for under-privileged or deprived families, but even then it would be difficult to judge the merits of individual cases.
Why do you expect our youth development programmes to produce players essentially capable of winning the Champions League already, especially considering we were renting Harlington before and previously focused on signing foreign players on the cheap rather than produce our own?
The fact remains that John Terry, who signed his first professional contract in 1998, is the last player to successfully graduate from the academy to become a regular first team player.
For a club of Chelsea’s size and stature in world football it is an embarrassing statistic. Those figures are also amplified by the number of high-profile and expensive signings Frank Arnesen made, none of which have made an impact in the first team.
Chelsea supporters want homegrown talent in their team, players they can associate with and have an affinity with The Shed. I really hope Josh McEachran makes it, but ultimately when managers are under pressure they revert back to what they can rely on and that means experienced players.
Apparently you said once on talksport that you didn’t think Claude Makelele brought much to the team. Has your opinion changed?
Maybe we should get the talkSPORT tapes then because I don’t recall saying that. However, I did say that I regarded the position as one of the easiest on the field, primarily because it’s a housekeeping job.
It’s not difficult to read a game sitting in front of the back four and there is no particular onus or responsibility to mark a certain player because so few teams play someone in the No10 position.
Makelele was immense at Chelsea, smashing into tackles and snapping at the ankles of onrushing midfielders. He tidied up and moved the ball on to someone who could have greater impact in attack.
Makelele scored highly because he was so committed, but he wasn’t in Roy Keane’s class. Keane saw defensive duties as one of many chores but he offered a whole lot more when he was in possession.
With thanks to all those who helped pose questions through twitter and, of course, to Neil Ashton.
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