A simple, effective way to improve football journalism
Covering football as if it is a competitive sport and not a 'narrative' is a good thing
Today I’m going to provide one way to address one of the most pervasive problems in media—how journalists can overcome the perception of bias in their reporting.
I’m going to write about this problem in a football context, but the lessons from this post could be applied to the absolute gong show that is political reporting in 2020.
Before you read on, though, you should probably look back over these latest two (public) posts on the footballing theory of value, wherein I argue that the sole source of value in football is competition and that everything clubs do—everything—should be regarded in competitive and not moral terms. In a subscriber’s only post, I also gave a few examples of how this shift in perspective can give clubs an advantage in how they do business.
Today, I will argue that the Footballing Theory of Value is also useful to football journalists, who often run into trouble (or write boring things) because they continue to, unwittingly in some cases, view football through a moral lens.
All too often, reporters fall into the trap of subtly portraying one party—whether a club, a supporters’ group, a player or manager—as the protagonist, who faces an uphill struggle against an antagonist—another team, usually wealthier or more successful, an owner, a city council (this is a big one in MLS). Here, the conflict is usually well described, but the context and options for resolution are vague and unclear.
For example, a poor result means one team ‘may be in a fight to stay up come May.’ A badly managed club ‘makes fans pine for the glory days when the club played at this now-demolished ground.’ A manager must ‘prove their mettle’ before the ‘board runs out of patience.’
The result is journalists writing news articles that sandwich potentially interesting new information between the same endless run of footballing tropes and cliches. Moreover, these articles fail to provide any real, incisive insight into who the respective actors are, why they are in conflict, and—perhaps most important—why the reader should give a shit about any of this at all.
However, once you accept that the sole locus of value in football is competition, things fall into much starker relief for the hardworking journalist. Clubs no longer ‘battle’ to stay up; they either are or are not using their limited resources wisely to try to avoid relegation. Managers are no longer ‘ruthlessly sacked’, but let go as either out of panic or as part of a reasonable long-term strategy—one that needs to be spelled out for the reader.
Accepting the Footballing Theory of Value means going beyond relaying a self-satisfied narrative of events, but working instead to understand the competitive, motivating factors driving various decisions or the implications that match results, tactics, recruitment has on a club’s overall competitiveness. It forces the journalist to not merely report, but understand.
As a bonus, while subjectivity will still colour a journalist’s interpretation of ‘the facts,’ this approach tends to avoid the usual problems of media bias. A small club playing a big club no longer falls prey to lazy David/Goliath framing—which tends to tell us more about the individual inclinations of the writer than the actual match—but instead can be viewed as to their respective long and short-term competitive goals. Why does Burnley vs Manchester City matter? Maybe, once one understands the answer, it turns out it might not even be worth writing about. But you once you see clubs, governing bodies and supporters groups as competitors rather than protagonists (or antagonists), you produce something that is inherently less biased and more interesting.
Of course, some might argue this would take the romance out of football reporting, reduce it to a dry analysis. What about football as art? Football as literature?
But this is a facile view. There are many journalists who are able to write with style and panache while also giving us a detailed and dispassionate account of the competitive, motivating factors behind why clubs do what they do. I would mention here Gab Marcotti and yes—Brian Phillips. These are also journalists who are rarely accused of bias and also do a lot of background research on their subjects, and whose work tends to lack any and all cliche.
But yes, it would require journalists to do more work—not necessarily in reporting (though it may require that), but in thinking. Why does Burnley play the way they do? Does their recruitment strategy suit their objectives? Is the threat of a Super League or a point of leverage? And if so, leverage to get what kind of concessions and from whom? And so forth. Viewing football solely through a competitive lens also forces journalists and editors to think about what kind of things are worth covering at all. What makes the opinions of a retired Premier League journeyman relevant today? And why? Maybe they’re not! And if so, is this the type of thing we’d want to spend resources covering?
Finally, this approach could be expended to politics, which again too often regards politicians as moral agents rather than agents competing for political power. But that’s a topic for another time (and place).