Antony,
The Morning Line may be a ‘bit of fluff’ nowadays, but it used to be a proper racing program with serious discussion of the races to be shown later that day.
A group of people that knew their form were allowed to spend five or ten minutes per race, with regular use of archive footage. Big Mac dealt with issues affecting racing in a grown up manner. Jokes were kept to an absolute minimum. The presenters and pundits talked one at a time. Interviews were conducted in a professional fashion and because Ch4 often covered racing on a Friday, they would show interviews recorded the day before.
There was no internet to tell punters what was being backed – Big Mac was the only source of info on steamers, and that alone made it compulsory viewing for punters.
In short, it was a disciplined and informative magazine program that treated it’s audience as adults with an interest in racing and betting.
Sadly in your lifetime, it has declined into a shambles with no structure, and the main performers involved have become parodies of their past selves. The decline is epitomised by the sad sight of Big Mac, once a genuine campaigning journalist, now that most dreadful thing, a ‘celebrity’ who believes his own publicity and plays the role assigned to him.
To those of us old enough to remember the program as it was in the 80’s and early 90’s, the current rubbish is unwatchable and the advent of another ‘celebrity’ seems highly unlikely to change that.
AP