This is fucking brilliant...
Match of the Day: Robbie Savage represents the triumph of personality and opinions over perceptiveness
The former Wales midfielder is loved by media executives - but new vehicle Fletch and Sav suggests that having an opinion is now all that matters
He's here, he's there: Robbie Savage is being given plenty of opportunity to air his trenchant views in the media Photo: GETTY IMAGES
By
Jonathan Liew
9:15PM BST 24 Aug 2014
When global warming finally strikes and the polar ice finally melts, when the oceans swell and rise, when the great flood washes over us and submerges our petty dreams, when humanity and everything it has ever created lies underwater, then many aeons from now some intelligent life‑form will descend on our planet and pick over our remains.
From our homes and cities, they will deduce that a great race once inhabited these shores. From our palaces and cathedrals, they will know we were ruled by some sort of deity. And from our tablets and manuscripts, they will conclude that this deity went by the name of Robbie Savage.
If omnipresence is the first step to godliness, then the Church of Savage is thriving. These days, it is almost impossible to follow football at any level without encountering his He‑Man features at some point: via Twitter, his newspaper column, his various radio forays or his new weekly BT Sport vanity-vehicle
Fletch and Sav.
The special anniversary episode of
Match of the Day on Saturday night rather unflatteringly juxtaposed Savage with the measured elegance of Barry Davies, which is a bit like following the greatest meal of your life with a loud belch in the car park.
So what is Robbie Savage? More importantly, why is he? Media executives appear to adore him, perhaps because his inherent narcissism is seen as a lovable trait, his undercooked man-in-the-pub opinions venerated as evidence of some sort of common touch. Like a David Brent of the Valleys, Savage is a friend first and a pundit second. Probably an entertainer third.
A Savage opinion is a bit like the weather – wait long enough, and invariably it will change. Before the season, he hailed Manchester United’s “vast improvement”, and foresaw a return to the top four. Six days later, he was claiming that United had “10 days to avert a catastrophe”, and that they would struggle to break the top six.
But perhaps this is missing the point. What matters, as far as Savage is concerned, is not the opinion itself but the vehemence with which it is expressed. After all, the BBC press release announcing details of
Match of the Day’s 2014-15 coverage boasts of the “strong opinions” that Savage brings with him.
BT Sport for its part describes
Fletch and Sav as “provocative debate”, although the only provocative thing about Saturday’s show was the framed photograph of Savage himself displayed prominently on the table.
As Martin Luther King almost said: “I have a dream that my four little children will one day be judged not by the colour of their skin, but by the strength of their opinions.”
There is a sense that Savage is indulged not for his wisdom or wit, but for his lack of either: a sort of television ringworm, forcibly burrowing its way into your subconscious. You cannot be irritated by Savage, because as soon as you are irritated, he has won. Even this very article constitutes its own white flag of surrender.
In Susan Cain’s 2012 book
Quiet, the author charts a seismic cultural shift that occurred over the 20th century: the triumph of Personality over Character.
In the 19th century, the ideal social archetype was introverted: serious, cerebral, honourable. Nowadays, what matters is not what you are, but the image you project. Every life is a performance. Society is rigged in favour of the showmen, the charlatans, the overconfident.
In this context, the inexorable rise of Savage makes perfect sense: a self-styled ‘personality’ whose character has been called into question by fellow professional Graeme Le Saux. Le Saux accused him of making homophobic insults during their playing days, although Savage claims not to recall this.
Naturally, it is easy to get immoderately agitated over football pundits. But what makes Savage so objectionable is not so much what he is, as what he represents. A creeping inanity, a gathering storm of dimness, a consecration of the lamentable idea that being “opinionated” is somehow a virtue in itself.
His presence on our screens, ahead of others far more learned and perceptive, is an ongoing insult to anybody who has ever opted to think before they speak.
