Graham Reid: Mate, you're rubbish

COMMENT

Humour is a personal thing but, I like mine to be funny. So when people told me Sports Cafe was funny I thought I might have found my programme.

That was many years ago and, after a brief skirmish with the show, I gave up and bit my lip. If that is what people think funny - inarticulate sportspeople making weak jibes, Marc Ellis as a one-attitude moron, interviews that went nowhere despite all the participants laughing - then clearly I had it wrong.

I left Sports Cafe long ago, although admit to catching Eva the Bulgarian once because she was the hot new cult thing on television. And that news made me despair even more.

But mate, if you think Sports Cafe is awesome, then that's fine by me. I'm not putting a gun to your head and saying, "Get a life". But I hope you do.

Sports Cafe has celebrated 10 years on air, so they have released a DVD called What Were They Thinking? Actually, Sports Cafe has been on air only nine years but that's the kind of thing they think is funny. You know, 10 years but actually only nine. Gettit? Yeah, no mate, do you gettit? Jeez. Awesome.

It is appalling. Possibly the worst collection of interviews, moments (which is what promo people call accidentally amusing things for which no one involved can claim full credit) and adolescent skits. Jeez, that was funny when they tipped Matthew Ridge into the pool, eh?

What you get with What Were They Thinking? is the answer to that question. The answer is, not a lot. They weren't thinking about you who might have bought this thinking it was chock-full of funny or enlightening stuff. .

For the first hour I was genuinely mystified as to whether this was a best of, an outtakes and bloopers collection, or a selection of all their most boring moments - because that would be really fun, eh?

It was when Neil Finn told an anecdote that was interesting and made sense that I figured out it wasn't the latter, but it surely couldn't be a best-of when you considered the dross scattered throughout. So I have no idea what this is meant to be, and I cannot tell you what happened in the last hour. I have much better things to do with my time.

As far as I can tell, what you get here is a cobbled-together collection of mostly uncredited interview subjects saying things like, "Oh yeah, no, I was pretty good. And the boys did well."

Sample question: Is it hard being away from the family? I dare anyone, drunk in a pub, let alone sober on national television, to answer anything other than, "Yes, it's hard being away from the family."

Let's be honest: sportspeople are not the most articulate folk. And that's fine, they aren't paid to talk. (Even more odd, then, that someone thought some should be paid to interview.)

So this is what you get from Sir Brian Lochore, on the show to promote a book: "I'm just a New Zealander who enjoys rugby and the people around it."

What Were They Thinking? is insulting. It is a lazy piece of product undeserving of shelf space. It has all the hallmarks of what is known elsewhere as vanity publishing, but of course these people have so little to be vain about. Mate, you were rubbish.