It Gets Earlier Every Year

So, the Premiership Football season, or "the season" as Richard Keys has it, and already I find Andy Gray and the aforementioned Keys tedious beyond belief.

Partly this can be attributed to the fact that my team, Leeds United, are still in the Championship and neither Keys nor Gray are able to understand that football outside of the Premiership actually exists. Keys in particular getting out the slogan "the season starts here" after I'd already seen Leeds play on the TV (and Vorwärts Steyr at Vorwärts Stadion, but they can be forgiven their ignorance of the lower levels of Austrian football).

Gray, who once seemed a passionate pundit if a little overloaded with catchphrases, has turned in to being merely a shill for the Premiership and Sky's coverage of it. Being one of the old boys he can't quite bring himself to criticise any footballer, but on catching something even slightly amiss with a linesman's decision he'll bring all of Sky's IT deparment's expertise to bear on the problem with electronic recreations that must have conspiracy theorists the worldover drooling with delight.

That, in the face of all that, Keys is an even shriller corporate shill must be an achievement worthy of some kind of prize.

It's not that I particularly despise either of them, it's just that I'm sure it took much longer for my tolerance of the pair to dissappear last season.