"Who does the First Minister think the people of Scotland trust more on sport: Dougie Donnelly or Stewart Maxwell?"
Whereupon, with one voice, the great Scottish public responded "Stewart who?", followed by "And who is this Nicol guy anyway?"
On the other hand, we should remember that Mr Donnelly is not actually a sportsman of any note. He has never thrilled the terraces as he jinked his way down the by-line; his struggle to lower his golf handicap has been a private matter rather than subject to comment in the public prints; and when he visits Hampden, Wimbledon or Aintree he is not entitled to use the tradesman's entrance. No, Mr Donnelly is a commentator, an ancient mariner doomed to roam the tv schedules, importuning casual channel-surfers to tune in to the bowls at East Kilbride (or to visit a certain central Scotland furniture store). Nevertheless, despite a somewhat dated taste in sweaters and some continued speculation about the colour of his hair, Mr Donnelly has the invaluable ability to state the bleeding obvious in a manner which is not excessively irritating. Just why this qualifies him to chair a public sector company concerned with supporting Scotland's elite athletes remains a minor mystery - but then life is so often like that.
2 comments:
I found Nicol Stephen's question quite chilling.
No, not because of the content itself but his almost strained repitition of Dougie Donnelly's name. He sounded like that deranged fan from Alan Partridge:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3YUlcyPXLo
I think it would be in order for Her Majesty's press corp to ask Nicol if they could see round his house to reassure themselves he hasn't made a shrine to Dougie Donnelly.
If not I fear 24 hour police protection for Dougie may be required.
It's also worth pondering why no one in the media has yet had the audacity to ask oor Dougie to defend the achievements (or otherwise) of his Institute. It certainly has been doing a job on the hiring experts side (see the spending set out in its annual reports) but that ain't the same as delivering an actual improvement in the performance of our athletes.
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