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What on earth is going through the minds of ITV Sport?

For those of you who are unaware, this season’s Champions League coverage has been most notable for Andy Townsend and Ally McCoist providing punditry, not from the studio with the presenter, but stood in front of a table on the side of the pitch. Here they’ve been rained on, drowned out by the crowd and once, brilliantly, had, “Go home BBC!” hollered at them. Absolutely everyone has taken the piss out of it and I can find nobody who think it’s a good idea. And yet they’ve been there all season.

For last night’s final, Ally and Andy were out there again, but Terry Venables was also providing punditry – from the studio! So some of the pundits were inside and some were outside, which I’m sure you can imagine really helped out with the banter and the discussion. Meanwhile for last week’s Uefa Cup Final, Ally and Andy were providing the punditry, but this time in the studio – because it wasn’t the Champions League, which is different.

Meanwhile, in the commentary box, David Pleat – third choice last season – co-commentated on both of the finals, with his high voice, irritating, “Evening all!” catchphrase and complete inability to pronounce anyone’s name. While this lunacy continues, ITV’s best presenter, best commentator and best co-commentator – Matt Smith, Jon Champion and Jim Beglin respectively – ended up doing Alan Shearer’s testimonial on ITV4.

Of course, we’ll have to endure six weeks of this during the World Cup. Who’d have thought we’d end up pining forMatthew Lorenzo’s Dallas Brunch?