# Neville, Keano, Wazza: old boys’ cosy punditry cohort pulling no punches

A Manchester United player of 2025 has even fewer places to hide than his 1990s Liverpool equivalent in this era of social media content.

## Introduction

Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be. “In my day” will be offered as advice until the end of time itself. Twas ever thus. Punditry is, by nature, viewed through the prism of the past. Glance into a Premier League press room on match day, the thickened waistlines and/or greying hair of former heroes will be present and correct.

The BBC’s _Test Match Special_ is forever travelling back in time, if not so frequently as when  was part of the team. The self-proclaimed “fastest bloody bowler that ever drew breath” constantly hailed back to the days of Leonard Hutton and the Yorkshire team of the 50s. TMS, despite cricket’s many modernities, has never truly extracted itself from its golden era of  and John Arlott.

Football, a sport of far greater partisanship, is full of such golden ages, depending on which club you may favour. A listener to Merseyside’s Radio City in the 90s on Saturday evenings could hear Ian St John, formerly half of ITV’s _Saint and Greavsie_, hold forth on the latest failings of Liverpool FC. “That’s no’ a Liverpool team,” the Saint, Kop idol turned keeper of the Shankly faith, would grumble.

Concurrently, viewers of _Match of the Day_ were presented with Alan Hansen and Mark Lawrenson, twin rocks of the 80s Liverpool machine turned shirt-sleeved critics of serial champions turned tabloid fodder “Spice Boys”. Hansen’s Clackmannanshire baritone and Lawro’s Lancastrian, Mavis Riley-like whine would dissect their former club’s performances, punches occasionally pulled in the hope things would turn around. They weren’t angry, just disappointed.

A Liverpool player of the time would have few places to turn to avoid disapproval. On Sky, Phil Thompson, jettisoned from coaching after a falling-out with Graeme Souness, became an often searing critic. Around such time, neutrality was abandoned as an impossible job, giving rise to the largely partisan pundits found on pay-TV broadcasts. Every club has one, and if not, Steve Sidwell probably played for them.

A  player of 2025 has even fewer places to hide than his 90s Liverpool equivalent. In the pundit class, Sir Alex Ferguson’s players pervade, including, and this is no exhaustive list, Gary Neville’s groans of warning, Roy Keane’s squawks of disgust, Paul Scholes’s sighing disapproval and Rio Ferdinand’s rising volume.

Other former United stars are available. Most have contributed to a criticism of their former club that has become an avalanche. Punches are rarely pulled. None has an official role at United like, say, Micah Richards’ club ambassadorship for Manchester City. The Glazer family’s – and latterly Ineos’s – lack of interest in a past that cannot be monetised has demobbed an army into one that now rails against them.



*Roy Keane does not hold back in the media but Ruben Amorim has the confidence to take on the old guard. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian*

Each reverse sees a former Ferguson charge rant, almost on a rota basis, Keane doing double shifts. Last week, as , it was Wayne Rooney’s turn, using the word “naive” to describe Ruben Amorim. The United manager’s riposte – “That’s why I’m here, at 40 years old, coaching Manchester United” – was a missile guided towards his critic’s struggles to establish himself in coaching.

Where Liverpool players of their doldrum era have spoken of the dangers of kicking back, Amorim retains the self-confidence to take on the old guard, becoming a gift to headlines, adding fire and colour to common-and-garden quotes follow-ups.

Technology has added multitudes. Social media, where Neville’s partner in punditry, the perennially online Jamie Carragher, is usually found, is key, though the collapse of X into a Dante’s Inferno of wrongness has lately lessened its impact. YouTube and podcasts are where the money is. The most piping-hot takes, too.

They are served hottest by _The Overlap_ podcast, where Neville, Carragher, Keano, Jill Scott and Ian Wright plus guests – Scholesey, Wazza, Butty, Schmeichs, Becks – perch round the type of kitchen island no Cheshire footballer’s mansion would be complete without.



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