Sports news on the radio
Hello, I'm responsible for sports journalism on national ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ radio - that's Radio 1, 2, 4 and primarily Five Live.
It's my first blog entry so I thought I'd give you an idea of an average day for me, how decisions are made and how our reporters chase (and hopefully break) stories.
My day starts with a call to the office after listening to the 0630 sports bulletin on Five Live.
Basically, it's to make sure we're leading with the right story, not missing anything and to check if there are any problems.
I get into the office at 0800, endure some of Garry Richardson's best gags and read through all the newspapers to see if there's anything we need to follow up or check out.
A good recent example was when David Beckham was dropped from the England squad. broke the story in their first edition and it was up to our football correspondent, Jonathan Legard, to verify it.
And that brings me on to one of the main aspects of my job: directing and liaising with our reporters and correspondents (people like Mike Ingham, Cornelius Lysaght, Pat Murphy and Gordon Farquhar).
Their expertise and contacts are absolutely critical to our news organisation and staying on top of the news agenda.
A good illustration is Pat Murphy's coverage of the Aston Villa story over the past month or so. In my view, no other journalist has been better informed or better connected than Pat.
Apart from monitoring our sports bulletins, the other main aspect of my job is the inevitable round of meetings...
Actually I quite enjoy them: they're vital for sharing information and coming up with ideas. On some days, I'll have an 0845 meeting, one at 0930, another at 1030 and then the Five Live Sport meeting at midday.
We spend a lot of time talking about which stories we think will most interest our audience and how we can 'move the story on.'
Just a few examples - last week, we spoke live to the Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck about Ken Bates, Owen Hargreaves' agent on Manchester United and Darren Campbell on Dwain Chambers.
Today, is dominating our thoughts. It's clearly one which divides opinion among our listeners - some blame the umpire, Darrell Hair, others feel the Pakistan team are in the wrong.
Our priority is to ensure we hear from all the key people involved in the controversy - and keep on top of a story which is developing all the time.
For our cricket correspondent, Jonathan Agnew, it's a question of reporting events in a fair and balanced way while, at the same time, offering an expert analysis of the situation. It can be a difficult line to tread but, with a story like this, Jonathan's experience and expertise are invaluable to us.
Ultimately, the aim of our sports journalism is to be distinctive, challenging, authoritative and agenda-setting.
