Quote: Perfect Pimbletts Pies "Yep, Johns stood down indefinitely and you can't blame Nine for that.
Well Andrew Voss this season is quite funny. I can't believe there is so little talent you can't find others to fill a vacancy and give a League-focused light entertainment program. You don't have to have ex players. I bet there are some comedians/presenters who'd give the right arm for that gig. Maybe get a decent female presenter in to make it more appealing to women.'"
This season, they've often used Jacquelin Magnay, who writes for the Sydney Morning Herald, in a futile and somewhat cynical attempt to satisfy some of the show's critics and boost the female audience. It says a lot that the only woman they can get who knows a bit about the sport (League isn't her main thing I understand) is there only after pressure from the top to put her in. The whole situation's made worse in that she's like watching paint dry - or whatever the audio equivalent of that is! (all IMO, of course!)
As I said, the Nine Network and the media at large felt that the Footy Show was too 'Blokey' and was full of idiotic, chauvinistic nonsense. They were right, but that's why we all loved it - or at least I did!
So they've thrown in Vossy in an attempt to talk more footy, thrown in Magnay to add some token female presence and swapped all the lunacy and hi-jinx for super dull commercially sponsored segments, betting odds and longwinded discussions about chicken wing tackles and the like, were everyone ends up agreeing with one another anyway.
Fatty's never been a great presenter IMO - he can't read an autocue - but that has never really mattered because it was all a bit of a laugh. Now its all supposed to be so slick and Fatty just ends up looking crap. Both he and Matty Johns have also looked far from comfortable in their own skins at times this year, almost seeming to bite their tongues on occassion, when previously they'd have let rip.
The Footy Show is finished. Long live the Footie Show
