Advertisement for the rags on Sky

[Peter Doherty (AGAIG)]

To me that advert is just their lead pundit talking about what makes you fall in love with footy. Your dad taking you for the first time, the excitement and how the bug gets you etc. Could be any bloke talking about his first time.

I do think there is a kind of institutionalised bias at sky but think some are over analysing this advert.

At least its not redknapp talking about honest harry teaching him about brown envelopes at Bournemouth

And it should be just any bloke talking about his first match etc.

In fact, it should be a few tales of nostalgia. That would be nice.

But sky have appointed one of the most outspoken rag players as their chief analyst and co commentator. He is everywhere on sky now. He is good in his analyst position, but they weren't to know that. He got the job because of who is was.

And no matter how it is painted up, that ad is an ad for man united. Plain and simple. Or else I have learned absolutely nothing about how propaganda works.

The media/sky bias is pushed in the same way as the officiating. Small decisions that make you wonder. Over the course of the season they all add up to influence outcomes.

And the media helps persuade the neutrals and those who wonder, that everything is ok. That united have tradition, history, guts, glory and are trying to fight evil on all fronts.

Between the media and the officiating, they are one powerful machine to overcome. How we did it last season I will never know.

But I'm fucked if everytime another little snippet of bias lands under my nose I'll just play ball and pretend it's just the way it is... or at least all is how it should be. No way.

I want fairness. It may never happen, but that sure as shit doesn't mean I shouldn't keep asking for it.

I want no manager to be able to talk to/about officials before or during a match. Because I'm big and ugly enough to know humans influence other humans.

I want retrospective bans to be the same for each club and not at the hands of the media, who simply have to repeat footage again and again for an investigation to be launched.

I want goal line technology. I want every bit of technology possible that will enhance fairness without affecting the speed of the game. I want the ref to use a stop watch so every game gets 90 mins and not have *chuckle chuckle* good old fergie time.

A level playing field. From the pitch to the paper.

Anyone who thinks we have that is bonkers.

Ps. I want lou macari to stop breathing.

Absolutely bang on the money in every respect. Trying to argue that we have balance on Sky or any other media outlet, or in the premier league and that there isn't institutionalised rag favouritism can only be a rag or in complete denial, even in the face of overwhelming numbers of examples. Frankly that sapphire attempts to redress the balance are frankly laughable. One a clip about the rags AND blues and another that has a 5 second snippet of us scoring a goal against the rags that you could miss if you blinked. That against the constant replaying of the Rooney goal and now a club political broadcast o the rags played every single f*cking day.

Does anyone not question the rags winning the league in the very first season of the premier league!? Fortunate coincidence?

If ever you want to understand the power of the media it is almost the born again views that some City fans now have of rat boy Neville. have they forgotten that he is probably one of the most hated rags ever to have worn the rags shirt. You couldn't have found one blue with a good thing to say about the tw* 2 years ago. Now I regularly come on here and other forums hearing blues singing his praises!! The guy is a rag to the core, you think underneath the tv bravado he is thinking of anything but hate for our club. Of course it will be subtle but I don't trust a word that leaves his mouth and no amount of decent analysis will change the fact that he hates our club.

It is beyond my comprehension that some blues would even try and mount a defence of this no matter how pathetic.

^^^^^^superb post^^^^^^ Not just in football, but anywhere you look, the media have their own (invariably financial) agendas. In this country, the rags pay the rent.

[sidSmith]

I think some people just want to believe it is balanced or choose to try to ignore it, as some have already stated.

But the rest have had a job done on them. Don't forget, propaganda works. Otherwise it wouldn't exist.

As long as it sells, they will sell it.

Propaganda, paranoia and mass hysteria are all apparent in this thread!

What did we expect? At lease we get referred to as champions, occasionally. The scum have had years of ill gotten success. We can only be masters of our own destiny and do our best to change things, but that's going to take time. It's been the case that they are one of the latest, if not the largest, global sports brands. Yes it stinks, but the money from Sky will be tiny as long as they own there own image rights, unlike teams in NFL, NBA, etc. (FFP conversation)

If you feel you want to watch a fairly average picture over the Internet, that's your choice, but your contribution would have been so negligible, I don't see the point..... Guy in the newsagent this morning was wearing a scum shirt, now I'm sure he's going to use some of the money I handed over to buy something scum related. Shit! What have I done?!? ;-)

[Beefymcfc]

Well just think all them silly people buying it are gonna give us a load of money because of their foolishness.
Just think if the fuckers did not advertise to the rags they would have no money to give us.

Their continued success is actually good for us. One of our draws is the fact that we are now directly up against the Rags and the Derbies are once again hot property to all the media outlets, especially after last seasons events.

Don't fool yourself though, there is only one winner in the battle for Murdoch's love and that's the Rags. The rest are there to make up the numbers and to promote their product. Why do you think Taggart builds up the Rag v Dipper Derby for Sky? He could easily say that they are no longer contenders but keeps the impression that there still rivals. He's been there for years and knows how to sell a game to the punters.