4 hours ago
9
During England's run to the Euro 2024 final last summer, it went under the radar that 19 members of Gareth Southgate's 26-man squad had played in the EFL in the formative years of their careers.
Several of those 19, including goalkeeper Jordan Pickford, who now has 80 caps for his country, had even featured in all three divisions.
The 72 clubs that make up the EFL and often remind us about everything that is good with the game in this country - community, passion and aspiration - are a huge part of our football fabric then, right?
Well, not in the eyes of ITV, who continue to let down supporters far and wide by giving the impression they're not really bothered.
Yes, it's a challenge to service everyone's needs, but recent events have rung alarm bells.
Just last week, for the second month in a row, ITV - who won the rights to show EFL highlights back in 2022, then retained the rights last year to 2027 - didn't put on a dedicated programme during the international break, seemingly because there was no Championship action to show due to call-ups.
The EFL is a huge part of English football and provided a grounding for many stars of today - Jordan Pickford went on six loans from Sunderland, including to Preston in 2015-16
John Stones, who started the Euro 2024 final, came through at Barnsley before earning a move to Everton and later Manchester City
And Ollie Watkins, the hero of the semi-final, was an Exeter City product, then spent three years in the Championship with Brentford before joining Aston Villa
You might think: 'What an opportunity to celebrate other clubs and give them more airtime than normal.' But no. ITV didn't fancy it.
The Championship is obviously the highest-profile division in the EFL. But this season there are nine former Premier League teams in League One, plus several upwardly-mobile sides with growing fanbases such as Stockport County and Lincoln City.
The average attendance this season in the third tier is 10,857. That's on par with the top divisions in Belgium, Denmark and Austria, not far off Turkey and Portugal, and more than every second tier in the world besides Germany and even other major sports in this country, such as rugby league's Super League.
Try telling them - and the brilliant supporters down in League Two (average attendance: 5,351, week in, week out) - that their games don't matter and aren't worthy of being shown.
It's just plain disrespectful and feeds into a growing sense that those clubs will always be an afterthought. Just look at the FA Cup replays situation, or keeping the Premier League teams playing in Europe apart in the Carabao Cup third round. You wouldn't see Match of the Day taking a break if the Big Six weren't in action.
And that's before getting on to the coverage, which has been getting gradually worse since ITV scrapped studio guests and reduced the programme's running time ahead of the 2023-24 season.
Just last week, across the whistle-stop coverage of Saturday's action - which felt minimalist - there was one reporter at Oxford v Derby County and another at Kenilworth Road for Jack Wilshere's managerial debut for Luton Town against Mansfield.
Apart from that, it was a monotonous format of short highlights-reel after short highlights-reel, and most Championship games didn't even include post-match reaction.
It was even less for League One. There were pre-match thoughts from Luton fans on Wilshere's appointment, while both he and his Mansfield counterpart Nigel Clough spoke after the game. But that was as good as it got in terms of insight, bar a brief run through of the table at the end of that segment.
Jack Wilshere's managerial debut for Luton Town against Mansfield was one of the few games given some attention by ITV last weekend
ITV won the EFL rights ahead of the 2022-23 season with Jules Breach (pictured) and Hugh Woozencroft presenting, then reduced the run time and scrapped studio guests a year later
Further back, The Football League Show on the BBC was widely praised for its comprehensive coverage
This is a far cry from the days where the EFL highlights were treasured by Quest across a two-hour long show, or even further back during the BBC's Football League Show era when Steve Claridge and Manish Bhasin kept us company on a Saturday night.
And let's not forget, ITV have proven in the past that they can deliver - The Championship (bad title, admittedly) was an excellent fixture of Sunday mornings. Many long for a similar show to return and it really wouldn't be difficult for ITV to improve their product.
There are so many good EFL pundits out there, whether it be Sam Parkin and Adrian Clarke - who join Matt Davies-Adams on the popular What The EFL?! show - or Not The Top 20 with Ali Maxwell and George Elek.
That's without mentioning other experts like Gabriel Sutton, or out-of-work EFL managers and former players who I'm sure would be keen to get involved.
It doesn't even need to be particularly comprehensive, just a studio discussion with a few experts about key talking points from the weekend would do.
On Saturday, for example, why not have a panel talk about Wilshere's appointment in more depth, hand out praise to the incredible season Grimsby Town are having, or take a look at how Coventry City have become unstoppable under Frank Lampard? These are all easy wins.
Access to the EFL has never been greater through Sky Sports or YouTube, but ITV's programme is outdated.
Grimsby Town are having one of their greatest seasons in recent memory - but if you were trying to find out more about them on ITV, you'd be at a loss
MK Dons thrashed Bristol Rovers 4-0 in League Two over the international break - but the ITV's highlights of it were nowhere to be found
Fans can already watch highlights minutes after full time so to engage viewers, the product has to offer something different.
There are so many brilliant and unique stories within the EFL that are often untold, and the honour of hosting its highlights - on a programme called English Football League Highlights, not The Championship Highlights Show, remember - should come with responsibility to promote all three divisions.
Instead, we've gone from passion, dedication and analysis to the total opposite and the time has come for change.
ITV should let someone who cares take over. Because right now, they don't seem to be bothered.
