Crozier: Not running the FA any more
It’s a good job ITV’s exclusive £425 million deal to screen England internationals and the FA Cup is watertight until 2012.
FA bosses will probably feel like tearing up the agreement after a broadside this morning from Adam Crozier, ITV’s chief executive.
Crozier of course used to run the FA, where he appointed Sven-Göran Eriksson and heralded the “golden generation”, during a not uncontroversial reign.
He couldn’t resist setting his old employers straight when interviewed supposedly about ITV’s future on the Radio 4 Today programme. The FA was “not having a great time” at present.
Capello’s communication abilities with the players? “It would sound as though, listening to the mood music coming from the England camp, that the message isn’t getting across as clearly as it should be.”
Communication issues for Crozier
The naiveté of the FA for extending Capello’s deal before the World Cup failure? “I think we were very careful for example with Sven that we created clear breaks in his contract that would have allowed a parting in and around tournaments, because the truth is you don’t know what’s going to happen in a tournament before you go into it. You can only tell afterwards – as we saw in the World Cup this year.”
The FA suffers from a “massive conflict of interest” and needs “more independence to take decisions for the good of the game as a whole.”
New footie host Adrian Chiles is clearly under no instructions to give the national team an easy ride if England fail to shine in the Euro 2012 qualifiers, despite the deal Crozier has inherited from Michael Grade.
Will the two parties be at loggerheads when negotiations begin for a new deal, allowing the BBC and BSkyB to sweep back in? And doesn’t Crozier have enough on his plate reinventing ITV for the digital age without raking over what sounds like some unfinished business with the FA?
Crozier, whose admission that ITV1 will not become a “paid-for” subscription channel was rather overshadowed, generously admitted that ITV is a “fairly dysfunctional organisation” and “there is a lot that needs fixing.”
The Football Association might point to that little technical problem ITV has of switching furious viewers to adverts when key goals are scored during the FA Cup and World Cup.
Leave Fabio alone! We moan that England needs a frsh approach, a freash team and when Fabio adopts these ideas we go on a rampage. And as for the media, surely they can come up with better headline attacks…such as ‘Fabio gives Beckham the golden BOOT!’, instead pathetic headlines such as ‘WEIRDO’! Get a grip, get a flag and get behind the WHOLE three lions!
All very fair points and I thought similar things when I heard it on R4 Today earlier.
Yet Crozier’s comments are, at least, dead honest. I think he’ll gain more respect for speaking his mind rather than sitting on the proverbial fence like so many when asked about football matters. And that should outweigh any tutting over the ruffling of FA feathers.