By Oliver Sparrow, writing from London

Stan Collymore unleashed a scathing attack on BBC’s ‘Match of the Day’ via Twitter last week, calling it ‘stale, clichéd and smug pap’.

Usually I don’t agree with Mr. Collymore, whose outspoken and brusque views are often ill-considered and unsupported by valid evidence, but on this occasion I can see where he’s coming from. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of MOTD, and I did a little jig of delight when the BBC won the Premier League highlights package back from ITV a few years back, but I can’t help but feel that the format has stagnated and the effort put into its production has waned in recent seasons.

The highlights themselves aren’t the problem – they’re fine; it’s the below-par, dour analysis and banter in between the games that puts me to sleep. The majority of their pundits have very boring personalities. If you’re ever having problems getting to sleep, try imagining Mark Lawrenson or Alan Shearer having an ‘engaging’ conversation with each other down the pub. As well as being largely boring, they don’t seem to have much banter with each other. The only disagreement that I can actually remember on any recent MOTD is Alan Hansen’s persistent belief that Theo Walcott doesn’t have a ‘football brain’ – whatever that is. It’s a disagreement between the pundits that is so rare that every time Walcott has a good game, it’s brought up as a comedy panto moment. I want to disagreement and argument, it makes for more exciting viewing and a more vibrant debate. Collymore describes the studio atmosphere as ‘… comfy, matey pap that probably spends more time talking golf rather than football.’ That comment hits the nail on the head for me.

Now, there’s not necessarily a problem with the pundits having mundane personalities. They can be as awkward as they like in front of a TV camera as long as what they’re saying is interesting and illuminating. Take David Pleat, for example. He splits football fans in half in terms of those who love him and those who are vehement Pleat-bashers – there seems to be no middle ground with him. Those who don’t like him usually base their judgement on his TV commentary, which admittedly is sometimes rather stilted and dry. However, if you actually listen to what he is saying, he always offers an astute tactical observation of the game, which is much more than you get from most commentators. (Don’t even get me started on Mick McCarthy who found Odemwingie so hard to pronounce he just called him ‘Number 9’ during the World Cup). I digress, but the point I was trying to make was that although he might not be the most exciting person to watch (or listen to in a commentary situation), someone such as David Pleat who has the ability to actually analyse a game and perhaps bring something to your attention that you hadn’t noticed before, would be a very welcome addition to the MOTD line-up.

As Collymore also points out, the level of research and depth of knowledge of the current game is often not up to scratch. He cites an occasion a couple of weeks ago when Alan Shearer was talking about Newcastle’s recent loan signing Hatem Ben Arfa. Shearer insisted that Ben Arfa had ‘slipped under the radar of the big clubs’ which is clearly not true. The 23-year-old man from Marseille was two years ago one of the hottest young prospects in European football. All the big clubs in the Premier League would have known about him, but they would have also known that his off the field behaviour perhaps would have been detrimental in the long run to their team. Ben Arfa is a top player, and one that most football fans will at least have heard of, especially if they have watched the Champions League over the past two or three years. It was a worrying void of knowledge by Shearer that should have no place on the most important and widely-watched football programme in the UK.

Whilst I largely agree with what Collymore is saying, I don’t really see how his alternative to the current MOTD set up would be any better. He thinks that the BBC should

Get a presenter that just presents. Put Lineker as lead pundit, get rid of Hansen and Shearer and revolve the pundits so that Andy Cole, Zola, Di Canio, Ian Wright, Sheringham, Cantona and plenty of players with ideas, opinions and passion all get us thinking about the game.

As Martin Samuel brilliantly pointed out in his response to Collymore in the Daily Mail, most of the people that Collymore suggests are his mates. It’s hard to see how that would be any different to the 19^th-hole club-house situation that viewers are currently subjected to every Saturday night.

Personally, I would like to see some bigger and more interesting names on the MOTD pundit roster. If it were different people every week, it would make the whole format a bit more exciting and less staid. How fantastic would it be if they could get big-time managers like Mourinho or Wenger on the show? The BBC probably couldn’t pull of a coup like that every week, but at least a change of personnel would freshen things up. It would be nice to see guests with some vigour and excitement about the game, and also some valuable insight. When I watch MOTD I would actually like to learn something that I hadn’t noticed before – something that interests me. The BBC have tried to do this in recent seasons with the introduction of more technology, but I can’t help but feel that watching Alan Shearer draw big red arrows on a still image of a game highlight is just papering over the cracks. The use of technology is all well and good (though perhaps not to the extent of Sky’s new American-style Monday night football show) but it’s the person using the technology that’s important. I’d much rather watch an old codger like David Pleat with his notes attached to a clip-board if they had something good to say.

However, I suspect that the BBC in their infinite wisdom have already tied themselves into multi-year, multi-million pound contracts with the current set of pundits that would cost even more of the tax-payers’ money to buy them out of – so we’ll have to put up with Hansen, Lawrenson et al for some time yet. I also suspect that the BBC will look at the viewing figures which are always going to be high for a national institution such as MOTD and think ‘why fix what ain’t broke?’.

Do you think MOTD needs to change? What would you alter about the current set up to make your ideal football show?