10 Times Football Pundits Lost The Plot In 2017

10 Times Football Pundits Lost The Plot In 2017
16:25, 12 Sep 2017

It's the job of a football pundit to watch and evaluate the performance of footballers. However, in doing that, the job by its very nature means the pundits themselves become the subjects of evaluation by football fans.

Anything a pundit says or does that is deemed to be incorrect or bizarre is scrutinised by millions of fans sitting at home - especially in the internet age, when things can go viral so quickly.

We all remember Alan Hansen saying you don't win anything with kids just before Manchester United won everything with kids. And we all remember Robbie Savage saying that, in certain games, he was world class.

What about recently though? Have pundits learned their lessons this year? Not even close. Here are ten times football pundits lost the plot in 2017.

Ray Wilkins

In June of 2017, during an appearance on Sky Sports News, Ray Wilkins made the startling suggesting that Spurs should make a move for Atletico Madrid's French superstar Antoine Griezmann.

The former Chelsea, Manchester United and England midfielder said "Wouldn't Tottenham look wonderful with Lloris, that back three of Dier, Vertonghen, Alderweireld, Rose on the left, Walker on the right, Wanyama and Dembele, Dele, Griezmann, Harry Kane?"

Wilkins isn't wrong. Spurs would look great with that team. They'd also look pretty fantastic with Messi, Ronaldo, Neymar, Kante and Ramos in their starting eleven. If only it was that easy to sign world class players and, you know, Spurs didn't have an explicit budget when it came to transfer fees and wage structure. Wilkins was being incredibly unrealistic, to put it mildly.

Paul Merson

You could fill a list like this with Paul Merson faux pas. However, in the interest of fairness, we'll limit the list to one per pundit. In this instance, it was Merson's take on the summer transfer window.

The window saw some huge moves; Romelu Lukaku to Manchester United, Alexandre Lacazette to Arsenal, Alvaro Morata to Chelsea, Serge Aurier to Spurs, Bernardo Silva to Manchester City and Mohamed Salah to Liverpool, just to give a few examples. There were some equally impressive moves for considerably less money, like Jermain Defoe to Bournemouth, Wayne Rooney to Everton and Jay Rodriguez to West Brom. But which player did Merson say was "the signing of the season"? Jon Walters to Burnley. No, really.

Now, there's no denying Jon Walters is a decent player and a coup for the Clarets, but the best signing of the season? Come on, Paul, give it a rest. His howlers feature every week on Sky Sports News...

Michael Owen

Like Paul Merson, Michael Owen has committed enough punditry sins to fill a list like this, but this one's a little bit different to most of them, as it doesn't involve him saying anything nonsensical in a monotone voice.

In the second leg of a Champions League round of 16 match in March of 2017, Barcelona performed one of the most amazing comebacks in football history. Having been 4-0 down from the first leg against Paris Saint-Germain, they looked out of it until 3 quick goals in the 88th, 91st and 95th minute saw them win 6-1 to go through 6-5 on aggregate. Cue a studio full of football pundits - including Michael Owen - going berserk.

Now, correct us if we're wrong (we're not), but didn't Owen used to play for Real Madrid? Gary Lineker (who used to play for Barcelona), Rio Ferdinand and Steven Gerrard all jumped for joy when the sixth goal went in, but Owen - who is usually very loyal to his former clubs - took off on a lap of honour around the studio, in spite of Barcelona being Real Madrid's fierce rivals. Weird.

Danny Higginbotham

It's a regularly done thing to create combined best elevens from a number of teams. In this particular case, Sky Sports pundit and former Southampton, Stoke City, Sunderland and Gibraltar defender Danny Higginbotham picked his best eleven from the top six clubs in the Premier League - and he made a couple of questionable choices to say the least.

In March of 2017, Higginbotham went for a 4-1-3-2 formation that looked like this: De Gea; Rose, Vertonghen, Alderweireld, Walker; Kante; Hazard, Alli, Sterling; Kane, Ibrahimovic.

The main issues here come in the form of Raheem Sterling and, to a lesser extent, Zlatan Ibrahimovic. With players like Alexis Sanchez, Sadio Mane and Christian Eriksen there to be picked, why choose the infinitely inferior and less effective Sterling? And although there's no denying Ibrahimovic's quality, after a single season in the Premier League - and at the age of 35 - should he really have been picked above the consistently brilliant Sergio Aguero, who has shone in the Premier League since 2011 and is in his prime? We think not.

Frank Lampard

Frank Lampard knows a thing or two about playing in midfield. The former Chelsea and England ace scored a club record 211 goals for Chelsea from the middle of the park and another 29 for England. That being said, we have to question his judgement here.

In March of 2017, after Chelsea had beaten 10-man Manchester United through a rare N'Golo Kante goal in the FA Cup, Lampard said Kante was the best midfielder in the world. The former Leicester City man and current PFA Players' Player of the Year is brilliant - there's no doubt whatsoever about that - but he's got a long way to go before he should be considered the pinnacle of global midfield talent.

While he pops up with the occasional goal, Kante needs to carry more of an attacking/creative threat to rival the world's best. Moreover, he needs to show his pedigree in a World Cup or in the Champions League, which he is yet to do. At the moment, with those things in mind, the likes of Sergio Busquets, Arturo Vidal, Toni Kroos, Luka Modric, Andre Iniesta and Marco Verratti are all superior to the Frenchman.

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Jason Cundy

Former Chelsea, Spurs and Ipswich Town defender Jason Cundy currently works as a presenter on talkSport and occasionally appears as a pundit on television. He is known for being very opinionated. This opinion, however, is pure unadulterated nonsense.

In March of 2017, Cundy claimed that Scottish giants Celtic have less fans than some League One sides. What did he based that claim on? Believe it or not, it was the club's Twitter following (and some wild guessing).

Cundy said "I’ve looked on Twitter about how many people follow football clubs. Newcastle United have 1million followers, Celtic haven’t got half of that. There are some Championship clubs and I reckon even some League One clubs that have a better Twitter following than Celtic." He "reckons"?! Regardless, the team with the highest average attendance in League One in the 2016/17 season was Sheffield United with 20,141 (33,000 capacity). Celtic's average attendance in that same season was 55,476 (60,411 capacity). End of discussion.

Chris Sutton

Former Premier League and Golden Boot winner Chris Sutton is one of the more straight-talking pundits working at the moment. He says what he thinks and he talks sense most of the time, although he does have a tendency to show a little bias towards his former clubs - and he went too far in that regard in this instance.

In August of 2017 on BT Sport, shortly after Rangers had achieved their first ever league win over Ross County, Sutton quizzed Gers boss Pedro Caixinha over his previous claims that his squad was the best in Scotland.

A former Celtic player, Sutton's required impartiality as a pundit went out the window, as he asked Caixinha which of the current Bhoys players wouldn't get into the Gers' team. Sutton was clearly suggesting that Celtic had the best squad and that most of their players would walk into Rangers' first eleven - and he wouldn't let it lie when Caixinha refused to answer. He was subsequently criticised for his behaviour and came under attack from Rangers fans on Twitter.

Phil Neville

In January of 2017, Phil Neville made such an outlandish and embarrassing claim that his fellow pundit - former England striker Alan Shearer - had to shoot him down.

It came after Everton had hammered Manchester City 4-0 at Goodison Park in the Premier League, with former Toffees defender John Stones - who cost Manchester City £47.5 million when he made the move to the City of Manchester Stadium - putting in a particularly bad performance. Neville said of Stones "I actually feel sorry for him. I actually think he's been let down so badly by his centre-back partnership, and the full-backs he's been playing with."

Shearer was having none of it and quickly put Neville's argument to bed. Shearer said "People will come away from the ground today thinking: 'John Stones had a nightmare'. John Stones did have a nightmare. He is 22 now, he's played nearly 100 Premier League games. And everyone keeps saying to me and the rest of the football world that he's going to be a top player. But I keep seeing John Stones make mistake, after mistake, after mistake." That sure told Neville.

Robbie Savage

Robbie Savage isn't generally regarded as one of today's better pundits. He's a nice guy but, when he's giving his opinions, he often sounds like he's either angry or confused - sometimes both - which really doesn't help him get taken seriously. What he said in September of 2017 didn't do his reputation any favours at all.

Whilst in Dublin, Savage posted a picture of Irish pundit Eamon Dunphy on his Twitter account and took him to task on his opinions about Wes Hoolahan (Dunphy had suggested that Ireland would have got three points against Georgia if Hoolahan had played). Savage went on to suggest that Wales were so far ahead of Ireland that the only Irish player who would currently get near Wales' first team is Seamus Coleman.

As a former Welsh international, this reeks of bias from Savage to begin with, but it also ignores the fact that the two teams are only one point apart in their World Cup qualifying group. Moreover, it would seem Savage has forgotten about players like Shane Duffy, Jeff Hendrick, Robbie Brady, Harry Arter, Shane Long and Jon Walters - all of whom would at least be in with a shout of challenging for places in Wales' first team.

Graeme Souness

Graeme Souness is as straight-talking a man that you could ever wish to meet - and that makes for a great pundit. He does, however, seem to hate almost everything about the modern game, which sometimes makes you wonder why he bothers!

Speaking in August of 2017, just prior to the start of the new Premier League season, Souness claimed that Manchester United don't have a single superstar at their club. Souness said "I think when you go through the names they don’t have the superstar." We're not sure which team the former Scotland midfielder is looking at, but you have to disagree with that assessment.

Paul Pogba is one of the best midfielders in the world, Romelu Lukaku is consistently one of the Premier League's top strikers, David De Gea is arguably the best goalkeeper currently playing in England, Juan Mata is a World Cup winner and Marcus Rashford is currently the hottest property in English football - and that's not even covering everyone who could lay claim to being a "superstar" at the club. Zlatan Ibrahimovic hadn't re-signed for United at the time of Souness' comment, but he was on the verge of doing so and Souness must surely have known that as well. You can't help but think that Souness' disdain for modern football is clouding his judgement on this matter.

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