m@tt wrote:sussexpob wrote:Selvey was always crap
How about he was less crap before but has become crappier over the last 18 months?
(Tbh I haven't read that much of his prior to 2014 but some of his current critics do say he used to be a good writer)
I think it happened in the 2000's, around the time of the 2005 Ashes series. You noticed that with more people showing an interest in the sport, his writing became more like lectures, and his manner became more guarded. He didn't, and still doesn't, like the fact that mere mortals could have an opinion that is comparable to his... he after all played for England and knows more than you, he went to Cambridge too so generally is smarter than you, or so he thinks. I always found his voice to be superior, smug and self serving, maybe that has got worse as time passes.
He is, and has been for some time, a dinosaur lost in a world of technology and internet critique, he just didn't move on. He must be near 70 now, his opinions, his style, his awareness of the modern journalistic style and its counter balances are completely lost. He thinks he can dictate his opinion to his readers because they in someway are tied to what he says, and seemingly becomes angry that people don't nod their head at everything he says.
He is also tied politically now to the established cricket elite of the ECB, and has become a ghost writer for off handed and morally bankrupt leaks, and for that price he has increasingly sold away what little currency he has in being an impartial and trustworthy source.
If the turning point for his accelerated decline into mere "hack without merit" is present, then it is the point at which he left TMS, sometime after the 06/07 Ashes. Ironically he left because the programme was become too boorish in his opinion, that there was too much heavy handed and opinionated discussion taking place. He much preferred to talk about which cake they were eating, or what was happening on the Arches, or whatever crap the TMS people used to discuss to pass time. Talking about strong opinions on cricket? Didn't want to know.
I think that really underlines how behind the times he was