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Phrases and cliches to be banned (along with smoking)
By Will last year, at the end of June Leave a comment on this post
It’s D-day for me and millions of other happy smokers on July 1. Yet while we wheeze our way to a healthier lifestyle at the behest of our loving, caring, huggable government, there is one burning issue in the ashtray of politics which has yet to be doused: clichés. They are absolutely everywhere, and the disease is spreading thick and fast.
Lawrence Booth wrote a piece on it for 2006’s Wisden Cricketers Almanack (absolutely required reading), but still nothing has been done. And I’ve just read one of the worst - one of my most hated expressions - from Paul Nixon, regarding tomorrow’s Twenty20 kick-off: express yourself. “Just go out there and express yourself”. It provokes in me a boiling rage, and makes me want to eat my feet.
Talking of such things, Mr Booth scribbled this in his column a couple of weeks ago which caught my eye:
Moments before Monty entered the Lancashire library to share his
thoughts on his four-wicket haul in West Indies’s first innings with
the press, a member of the fourth estate decided to get to work on
the pad of A4 placed on the table in front of Monty’s seat
(presumably in case he felt the need at any stage to jot down a few
thoughts). “REMEMBER TO SAY,” wrote the journalist “HIT THE RIGHT
AREAS, WORK HARD, KEEP IT SIMPLE”.Enter Monty to stifled titters. He sits down, spots the advice and
chuckles out loud (the Spin has the chuckle on tape and will happily
place an audio version of it on-line if challenged). He points it out
to England’s media-relations officer, James Avery, who chuckles too,
and then scans the beaming faces before him in search of the culprit.
Superb. Lawrence’s The Spin is emailed to just about everyone who knows or cares about cricket, and journalism, every Thursday. Get it now.
And your favourite clichés? Come on; put your hands up and come to the party. Express yourselves…
Tags: cliches, disease, journalism, lawrence-booth, monty-panesar, phrases, smoking |
11 Responses to “Phrases and cliches to be banned (along with smoking)”
June 22nd, 2007 at 1.36 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 6.24 pm
Thought you’d packed up?
June 22nd, 2007 at 8.57 pm
blimey - more cliches than you can shake a stick at.
June 22nd, 2007 at 9.04 pm
Ohboyohboyohboy.
‘It’s a game of two halves’
‘I’m going to give 110 per cent’ (aaaarrrrrgggghhhhh!)
‘Taking it one game at a time’ (or, alternatively ‘We’ve got to take each game as it comes’)
‘It was a shame one team had to lose’
oh, and of course
‘At the end of the day’
June 23rd, 2007 at 11.16 am
Yeah, well, as Lawrence Booth should also know, if a player says anything remotely non-cliched and interesting, the press will pull half a sentence out of it, distort it and send it round the world as a totally misleading “news” story, causing an almighty ruckus about nothing. So I’m afraid I can hardly blame them when they resort to platitudes.
Also, unfortunately, players aren’t selected for their wit, wisdom, classical education or philosophical insights. They’re selected to take wickets and score runs. The attention they pay to taking wickets and scoring runs often precludes much use or development of the brain cells at all.
I’m afraid I cancelled my subscription to the Spin a couple of months ago, in a rage at some of Booth’s comments. Haven’t forgiven him yet.
There’s another cliche… “all credit to so-and-so for….” which I believe actually started with one of New Zealand’s more successful All Black captains, Sean Ftizpatrick, who said it about five times in every interview.
Personally I think sportsmen and women are over-interviewed when mostly they don’t have much of interest to say. (It’s like interviewing actors — they’re invariably less interesting than the characters they play.) The ones who are interesting are usually the ones who are introspective and a bit tortured and let the slings and arrows of sport get to them. Atherton’s a thoughtful chap and look how miserable it all made him, being on the big stage.
June 23rd, 2007 at 2.00 pm
Lighten up Kathy. Don’t take the media so seriously
June 23rd, 2007 at 2.51 pm
I’m with Jess- the 110% is infuriating. Mathew Hayden took it even further once, saying that he was “a billion percent” behind Ponting. All right, all right, you’re committed- enough already!
June 24th, 2007 at 3.41 pm
I’m a shocker for a cliche (or mixed metaphors before breakfast), so I can’t complain . . .
Not exactly a cliche, but a quotable quote: An Australian commentator on a rugby match several years ago, when asked for his predictions before the match, stated, “I think the team that scores the most points will win the game”. Hmmmmm!
June 25th, 2007 at 11.49 am
Last year someone at Sky was interviewing Butch on the boundary rope at the Oval. When asked how he approaches 20/20 in terms of captaincy, he started saying that, like General Holioake, he would tell them to “go out and there and express themselves”
He couldn’t get through the whole sentence without laughing
June 26th, 2007 at 10.03 pm
Another pet hate - bad grammer. As heard tonight on the Beeb after the Twenty20 Glamorgan v Somerset:
Richard Grant being interviewed: yeah, Ben and Mark wanted a win. They seen us home.
Duh?
July 6th, 2007 at 12.49 am
@Wraye
Its gramm(a)r 
My favorite sub-continental cliche…
“The boys played well…” - (made famous by Inzy and Azza)
They said it in almost every interview they gave!
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