point in case: chelsea/celtic. im fully aware ive harped on about this cretin before, but his commentary on this game was the singlemost vapid and unprofessional display ive ever heard. of course it goes without saying my heart sinks every time i know i have to listen to the bellowing meat-head, but you end up sort of girding yourself (like bracing for an oncoming crash) and accept it as just one of those things. but spending 90 (at least) minutes having to listen to him CONSTANTLY call neil lennon 'larsson', getting his facts COMPLETELY wrong (e.g. bretos informed us all that smertin was a new chelsea signing - he in fact signed last season and went out on loan to portsmouth, which naturally, wasnt even mentioned) and then the coup de grace - the infinitely hilarious accents that pepper the whole game. i wouldnt go as far as to say that it was racist, but for the same token, if bretos was covering a basketball game and imitating accents during that, surely hed be booted. yeah - hes doing it because he thinks its funny, but the depths of his idiocy paints fsw in a very bad light if you ask me. thankfully, i didnt hear georgio even grunt at any of the excruciating attempts at humor. that poor man - being stuck next to that brain-dead fog-horn for hours at a time. max: youre not funny. at all. you cant even research properly (and yeah - its YOUR responsibility to double-check the facts...if you had any standards, even low ones, you wouldnt run the risk of looking like you didnt have a clue. which you dont). you cant talk at a decent level. you must shout everything and try to make us believe that a mickey-mouse friendly is the height of footballing excellence/excitement. you insist on displaying your tarzan-esqe ability to mimic various dialects. all the while never considering that youre either offending someone, or making the fsw recruiting department look like its equivalent at the baghdad p.d. oh - and the accents are utter crap. you make tommy smythe sound like martin tyler. cheers nick.
p.s. for those who didnt see it (be grateful), max insisted on screaming "JACKIE!" with a scottish accent, every time jackie mcnamara touched the ball. oh, the tears of laughter! nick.
totally agree here... listening to that debacle was heart wrenching... a good commentator would get the names right... the accent was childish... he makes sky sports fanzone sound like a polished broadcast... go away max... go.... Cantona----
you know, thats bang on. here i was trying to think of 'stupid' in terms of an adult. but thats it man. something that someone may do, which isnt funny to begin with, but then does it again and again and again. HE GETS PAID FOR THIS. i really should be keeping a diary of all max's greatest - just so i could hand it in with a plea to get him booted. im sure he has a wife and kids and bills and other stuff but i dont care. as paying customers we should expect better. i watch fsw as much as (if not more than) any other channel. the price to pay is bretos. i know its america. and america has a hard time with soccer. but i will ask anyone out there to come up with a reason why we have to put up with this cretin? who the hell at fsw cares about quality? standards? professionalism? you could get a newspaper vendor to bark as much tripe as bretos for 1/100th the money hes probably on. its like listening to a 90-minute car-sales radio commercial. fsw - i implore you. hire someone who actually knows something about the game and who can actually talk in an intelligent manner. this man makes your station look idiotic. 'personalities' dont have to be vacuous and loud to get attention. hes the living embodiment of tabloid journalism. nick. ps - less of the accents in the mantd/bayern game. but still a plethora of inane soundbites and completely non-sensical comments.
Wait for the Max fans to come along and tell you it's his 'enthusiasm'. I had to mute the TV while watching the game today - or else destroy it. He's that hard to listen to.
I agree with whats been said. Max is an idiot, and he can ruin a game by himself. Its not enough for him to announce the match, he feels he has to put on his own little show. This is not suprising because if you do a google search for Max Bretos, this is what you find... http://www.judithweston.com/gallery4.shtml
I used to could take Max but he seems to be getting worse but Giorgio IMO is worse than him. He is the most negative announcer I've ever heard. He rarely says anything positive and he repeats the same thing over and over probably cos he doesn't know what to say. I know he is involved with CW in some facet but if they are trying to sell the game here in the US the least they could do is get two decent announcers. And yes, the Sky Sports FanZone commentary is WAY BETTER even with them being homers. I told my wife she could do better than either one with no prep work.
I have to admit I was getting quite annoyed during the Chelsea match when he kept referring to Petr Cech as "Chech" not "Check". I do think he had all he could do to hold back his ire during the Man U match at how poor the match was. I think Max could have used some real colorful comments that absolutely fit that situation.
to be fair, id wager he is on strict orders from his bosses NEVER to say the game theyre broadcasting is dross. but his description of the game as a "soccer festival" made me crack up. if i thought he had a clue what sarcasm was, id be applauding him right now. but he doesnt, so i wont. it really is ok to say a game is crap. new viewers will respect someone who calls it like it is, rather than try to convince everyone that it really isnt like a slow death. while the game perked up in the 2nd half (the kids were alright), the 1st was absolute gash. giorgio was indeed terrible. " ee needs to be ona the righta winga to be effective" seemed to be his only method of expression for the entire game. he was bang on the money with everything he said, just a little repetitive. still, his english p1sses on my italian. giorgio may not sound like the most erudite of announcers, but he knows the game which is something that cant be said of bretos. i wonder what gems will be uttered in the next game? 'maximum gobsh1te watch' starts here. nick.
While Max may not be the best, that clown doing color is just attrocious. Where did he come from? I am excited about the Champions World tour, but the not the announcing. I might be muting starting tonight.
There is a play by play guy, Max Bretos and a color man, that was the other guy. I think the other guy broadcasting is a clown and since he was the color man, he is a clown doing color. Make sense?
Max and Giorgio provide the perfect unintentional comedy to complement the glorified training matches that constitute the "Champions World" series.
Chinaglia is absolutely diabolical. Bretos is poor too, but at least he provides some entertainment with his foolish pronunciation and ridiculous accents. You would have thought FSW could get two knowledgeable commentators, the Scot on the FSW Report for example, or even two coherent US based supporters. Anything would be better than these two.
knowledgable? bretos is extremely knowledgable. he does so many different leagues and knows a lot about each player. you gotta understand what he is being given here. sure the players are wearing the man-u or celtic uniforms but mroe than half of the players playing are trialists and reserves no one has ever heard of outside of the UK. Max bretos for me is one of the best american soccer announcers because he shows true passion and love for the game. when he is having fun in the booth it makes the game that much better for me. I'd hang out with the guy had I the opportunity.
max strikes me as some of the other fsw broadcasters hired with absolutely no knowledge of soccer i mean you can just tell with the mispronounciations,idiot calls and how many times did we hear that jackie jackie mac line last night give me a break he comes of as a clown ofcourse they will know those trial players they have a list infront of them in a basic conversation without their cheat sheets those fsw commentators would be stumped btw giorgio does it again last night with baros,cissee and owen if you give him som space he vil barn you is it just me or does he sound just like the father from my big fat greek wedding clowns the both of them
Bretos shrieks so much I want to reach across the TV and pull out his voice box. He makes Jack Edwards sound like Orsen Welles.
For most of you guys, Almighty God himself could call the game, and you guys would find error in it... Two absolutes in life.... Death and Bigsoccer posters who think the announcer sucks... Max is a hulleva lot better then most of you give credit for, and given the amount of games he has to do, does pretty damn well. And IMHO, Mad Max is both entertaining, and for the silent majority who don't post, fun to listen to...
He might be irritating some times, but saying Max has "absolutely no knowledge of soccer" is a stretch. I'd bet he'd kick your butt (or most of ours for that matter) in any soccer trivia competition.
Well, being omniscient, He'd at least be able to get all the names right, and do every accent brilliantly. His comic timing would also be impeccable. My theory is that the posters who complain have the same problem with most announcers: the announcers are doing the game, and the posters are sitting at home watching it. And then there are the truly horrible commentators like Chinaglia, whom the Almighty might want to consider smoting (smiting?)... if not terminally, at least with a case of laryngitis. Look folks, go back to Michael K's post on the first page of this thread. That's what you do when an announcer gets on your nerves, whether he's universally (in the bigsoccer sense of the word) reviled or whether you alone seem to have an auditory allergy to his or her voice. It'll make you feel even better than you feel after venting on bigsoccer, really. You see, thanks to the mute button, you can play God and smote (smite?) the commentator into silent oblivion without leaving your couch.