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Football Grammar

Armchair Expert

Armchair Expert

Vedran Corluka
I've just been reading this article about Alex Pritchard: http://www1.skysports.com/football/...gland-under-21-star-get-tottenham-chance-soon.

It actualy highlights something that has been tinkling me off for a while.

In ths piece it states: “I think Alex goes on to grace White Hart Lane,” said Warburton recently.

I've also heard (or seen) lots of posters on here saying for example, after someone misses a headed chance: 'Benteke scores that'. WTF is this all about?

These sentences belie all grammatical knowledge I have (I taught English in German adult learning centres for a year or so). When people talk in the future tense they don't seem to use necessary possibility forms such as 'if' and 'would'.

I haven't been living in the UK now for the past 8 years - is this ugly usage of the language occuring in other areas of society too? Is is this dumbed down muck simply football talk?

If it is i think we are now finally seeing the effects of having illiterate coke heads presenting shows and ex-players with the IQ of a particularly inarticulate marrow masquerading as legitimate commentators in the public sphere.

Why do we have to endure the Paul Mersons of the world when mainstream TV could quite easily employ someone such as James Richardson? Or is the average football fan really a knuckle dragging neanderthal? If so, shouldn't TV companies accept some sort of responsibility and not further impare people's ability to speak their mother tongue? If someone struggles to the point of not being able to correctly form a sentence in their own (and probably only) language then surely there is a responsibility somewhere not to let thick idiots like Merson loose on TV in front of a dim-witted and impressionable public?

EDIT: sorry, I've just noticed that I posted in the wrong forum!
 
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"****** scores that" is a line that I'm pretty sure I've heard Paul Walsh use when he's been a pundit on the weekend.

You have pretty much hit the tickle my balls with a feather though, most of those phrases are things that ex-players that have turned pundit pedal out. Warburton usually sounds like he has trouble getting his words out, but that might be a speech impediment.
 
I'll add to this, do you refer to a football club as an object or a, I don't know person? Eg in England a team is referred to as an individual ie "Tottenham hotspurs beat so and so .... " But in Aus and I believe the U.S a team is a thing so it would be "The Tottenham hotspurs beat so and so ..."
 
par_18 said:
I'll add to this, do you refer to a football club as an object or a, I don't know person? Eg in England a team is referred to as an individual ie "Tottenham hotspurs beat so and so .... " But in Aus and I believe the U.S a team is a thing so it would be "The Tottenham hotspurs beat so and so ..."
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Either way it should never have an S on the end like that. That always really grates on me! ;)
 
par_18 said:
I'll add to this, do you refer to a football club as an object or a, I don't know person? Eg in England a team is referred to as an individual ie "Tottenham hotspurs beat so and so .... " But in Aus and I believe the U.S a team is a thing so it would be "The Tottenham hotspurs beat so and so ..."
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It is referred to as a named item.
The object ( thing) is the club, it is called Tottenham Hotspurssssss
Much like I am a ( the) person, called Barry.
 
Confused me even mor Bazza. i know it has a S on the end. But is it THE Tottenham, Chelsea etc or no THE?
 
I'm constantly annoyed by the grammar in successive generations, I work with a 21yr old who can barely speak English (yet has a B level GCSE in EL), his bastardisation of the language is infuriating, adding an S onto most words, every time he utters "yous" he gets shouted at, this was working fine until I habitually corrected an older woman in my local Sainsbury's in front of her two children and was told to "fudge off".
 
How did we get onto Sainsbury's? Was in Mortisons the other week, that little pick your own salad bar is unbelievable.
 
par_18 said:
Sainsbury's or the Sainsbury's, or Sainsbury?
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Your Lampards and your Gerrards is a pet hate of mine. Pluralising names. Your Redknapps of this world do it all of the time.
 
milo said:
Your Lampards and your Gerrards is a pet hate of mine. Pluralising names. Your Redknapps of this world do it all of the time.
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See now that I can almost work with, because he's describing a class of player and using their names.
 
As you say the football players have a lot to answer for, however the biggest fault lays with the reality shows that we are bombarded with on the box. They scrape the bottom of the barrel with the crew they get on there ( two brain cells and one of them is usually dead). And for some crazy reason they turn out to be heroes to some, no wonder there is a lack of grammar among the young.
 
par_18 said:
Confused me even mor Bazza. i know it has a S on the end. But is it THE Tottenham, Chelsea etc or no THE?
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I don't know of a specific rule for it, but I'd say no "the". Purely because our names aren't often plurals so it sounds wrong (the Tottenham Hotspur, the Manchester United, the Scum - OK that one works), in the US they often are so it works (the New York Yankees, the San Jose Sharks etc). You could say their names with or without the "the" though.
 
Thats more due to American sports franchises taking on objects which are often pluralised as names, Sun's, Bull's, Sharks etc, you can't (or at least you certainly shouldn't) pluralise Emirates Marketing Project or Liverpool Football Club for example as there is only one of them.

You could get away with The Tottenham Hotspurs if you are suggesting the players are the Hotspurs.
 
I hate the Arsenal. Both the team and their brickhouse fans putting 'the' in front of their team's name.
 
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