Minted

Did "former-player power" do for Colin Murray as host of Match of the Day 2 ?  The Mail suggests that pundits such as Alan Hansen (est BBC earnings £1m p.a.) had become increasingly unhappy that Colin was expressing footballing opinions, rather than providing easy questions to make them look good. rather than leading intelligent discussions about issues in the game.

I suspect there's more, and hope to return with some ratings figures when time allows. This season Match of the Day 2* is, counter-intuitively, on BBC1, and messrs Mosey, Cohen and Slater will have expected that move to the senior network to perform well, in core ratings as well as presenter approval.

Colin's sporting background is that of a fan - I think. This part of his entry on Wikipedia, I suspect, is not the entire truth...

Colin's passion for Radio came from his first career as a part-time member of the Fruit and Veg team in Sainsbury's at Forestside. After 3 weeks he left the job and began hustling 8 ball pool every Thursday night at Frames. It was at this venue were he famously came 9th in the 8 Ball Masters and from here he went on to become first reserve for the (SBBB) South Belfast Billiards Boys. Murray described his time with the SBBB as "a whirlwind of banter and an experience that I will never forget". To this day his cue remains in the club and in 2010 a statue was erected to honour his achievements, which was recently auctioned off for a staggering £13 to raise money for a vending machine at his old club.

*BBC sport, as a group, is reluctantly to change bad titles, even when they become totally meaningless, such as the 606 phone-in, on Radio 5 Live - nothing to do with the time or the phone number.