Soccer AM: Difference between revisions

Soccer AM is a British Saturday-morning football show presented by Tim Lovejoy and Helen Chamberlain. It has been broadcast on Sky Sports 1 every Saturday morning throughout the English football season since 1995, and is now not only one of the most popular football shows in Britain, but one of the most influential too.

Features

Now in its tenth season, the show has become famous for providing an eclectic mix of football, comedy and entertainment every week, and has seen its influence spread well beyond the world of football. Parts of the show have remained since the beginning, whilst others have been brought in each season. Every week sees a new group of celebrity guests, generally featuring at least one footballer (usually injured or suspended, and therefore free on a Saturday), and a mix of musicians, TV personalities and other sportsmen.

Fans of the Week

The "Fans of the Week" feature has been a mainstay - where eight fans of a British football club come in as studio guests every week, seated in the "Luther Blisset Stand". They are featured in various aspects of the show, culminating in a team footballing challenge at the end of the programme.

The challenge has been renamed almost every season, along with the background music that is played simultaneously. Its current format is "Road to Wembley", where the challenge is to kick a football through the hole in the "b" of an inflated version of the word "Wembley" as many times as possible in 1:20 from 12 yards. This is done with the background music of "Que Será, Será". Past versions of the game have included:-

• "We Are the Champions League" (2004/05) - celebrating Sky Sports' purchase of broadcasting rights for the Champions' League, the central star of a 3D Champions' League logo was removed and made the target from 12 yards. The background music was, surprisingly enough, "We Are the Champions" by Queen.
• "The Iron Curtain" (? 2003/04) - fans had to kick the ball through the Iron Curtain as many times as possible in one minute. Meanwhile, the Eastern European substitutes (wearing red CCCP tracksuits) would warm-up.
• "Sven Goran Eriksson"(? 2002/03) - a giant face of Sven-Göran Eriksson with his mouth wide open was the target, with the background music of "Sven, Goran, Eriksson, tra, lala, lala!" (to the tune of Brown Girl in the Ring).
• "Feed the Goat" (? 2001/02)- the target being the mouth of a giant goat, with the background music of "Feed The Goat And He Will Score" (to the tune of Cwm Rhondda) - a popular terrace chant for Shaun Goater at Manchester City.

The Crossbar Challenge

"The Crossbar Challenge" is a relatively new feature to the show, and involves a weekly trip to the training ground of a British league football team. The entire squad, including willing coaching staff and managers, are filmed, one-by-one, introducing themselves and attempting to hit the crossbar of the goal from the halfway line. The feat is rarely accomplished - the majority of squads fail to hit the bar once. However, a successful strike generally provokes manic celebrations by the kicker and his teammates.

Soccer AM aim to, at some point, visit every team in the league, although this is likely to prove very difficult as clubs such as Man Utd are unwilling to allow players onto shows such as these. Players who appear as guests on "The Orange Sofa" are always shown their attempt at the challenge if it is one of the many on the database.

Soccerette

The Soccer AM Soccerette has been a feature of the show from its outset, and is, effectively, a woman - generally young and attractive - modelling the "Easy" t-shirt that can be won by viewers who guess the number of goals scored by the Fans of the Week in The Road to Wembley. The Soccerette is introduced by Tim and a chant of "bada bada bada bada BING!", and is asked a series of (usually loaded) questions that almost inevitably lead into pre-prepared and cringeworthy gags. The standard question of marital status will result in rampant cheers in "single", and boos if "married" (although the latter is fairly rare). The former will produce the question "Do you have a boyfriend", to which the same answers apply. If the answer to either question is "Yes", Tim asks for how long. Regardless of the answer, it is declared "It'll never last!".

Third Eye

Third Eye has been a feature of the show from its outset, and involves viewers sending in often-comical mishaps from the television (generally football matches) that may well have been missed by the majority of the viewing audience. These typically involve people falling over or being caught doing something stupid.

Big Stan Hibbert

Another new, popular feature of the show - Big Stan Hibbert is "Here All Week". He makes an appearance early in the show with his standard mug one quarter full of beer, and cracks a joke to rampant cheers (and jeers). After his joke, he spins around one the spot and high speed with his beer mug held out wide, and when nothing spills (not a given) he declared "Centrafugal force!".

Topless Weather

Soccer AM crew member Sheephead gives his "weather forecast" for Britain without wearing a shirt. A popular member of the crew, he has recently taken to including gags in his forecast. "Light drizzle" has been forecast for London on every occasion of Topless Weather.

External links

• Official Soccer AM Website
• Comprehensive Soccer AM fansite
• All You Need To Know About Soccer AM