Shades of Gray

These days Andy Gray seems to be so busy preening himself as Sky’s Chief Pundit and a sort of ‘High Priest of Football Without Portfolio’ that he’s practically lost any sense of perspective he had in the first place.

Right now the man who made his playing reputation as a brave centre forward with Everton who specialised in headed goals (but very little else) appears to be head over heels in love with Chelsea – a situation which leads some of us to speculate as to what on earth they might have in common. The answer is simple - frill-free pragmatism with a side serving of arrogance. A determination to grind out results and to hell with entertainment. In short, football’s equivalent of Mogadon.

Once you understand that, you can readily appreciate why he’s so uncomfortable about Arsenal. As he settled into coverage of Watford’s game against the Gunners at Vicarage Road, Gray kicked off with the cheerful observation that Arsenal hadn’t won back to back league games since October, then followed up with a couple of combination punches – to whit, their finishing has been shoddy and they haven’t defended well. Later, and it seemed with some reluctance, he grudgingly acknowledged that they play really good football, but by that point it seemed Arsene Wenger’s boys were being damned with faint praise.

If Andy Gray is to continue playing with his toys and pronouncing judgement from on high on every game, every team, every manager and every conceivable issue, without subtitles and apparently undeterred by the fact that he has no managerial experience whatsoever on his cv, then the very least we can expect is a little more fairness and some measure of genuine commitment to the importance of entertainment at the highest level of the game.