By Mitch Phillips
LONDON, April 23 (Reuters) – Eddie Jones saw every press conference as an opportunity, while Roy Hodgson could barely hide his disdain for journalists, and a fascinating insight into how coaches deal with the media has been shortlisted for the Sports Entertainment Book Of The Year.
“On the Record & On the Ball – How Elite Coaches Master the Media”, published by Fairfield Books is the work of Tim Percival, Communications Lead with the England Rugby team, and the product of his two decades working in media relations in elite sport.
It is partly a handbook for coaches and players while also giving media professionals a different perspective on the people they spend their lives chasing and is packed with anecdotes from a range of sports and personalities.
“One of the reasons I wanted to write the book was to help coaches and the sports media understand each other better, as there can often be friction between them,” Percival told Reuters in an interview.
“I think anyone with an interest in how top-level sport works should find it interesting. It offers a look behind the curtain, which people always find intriguing. I also believe it’s a very good book for journalism and communications students.”
If anyone recognised the psychological opportunity of a press conference, it was former England rugby coach Jones, who was a master of delivering a point he wanted to make, particularly if he wanted to bury another. Even the most cynical journalists loved him as he invariably provided colour.
Percival saw the Australian up close and personal for nearly three years at England’s RFU and quotes his former colleague in the book: “Around the world, apart from probably New Zealand, rugby is fighting for recognition, so I think the national coach has got a responsibility to be engaging,” Jones said.
The approach often made for compelling viewing. “His media conferences could be absolutely brilliant and very entertaining to be part of,” adds Percival.
Jose Mourinho is another whose “antics” are widely covered in the book, including an explanation of how, in his Chelsea days, he had a special two-way relationship with The Sun newspaper, slipping them exclusive morsels but from his own agenda.
Former Australia netball coach Lisa Alexander is another who embraced the media. “The press conference is the fifth quarter, and your job doesn’t finish after a game until you go to bed that night,” she said.
“That fifth quarter, the press conference, is a vitally important part of your performance as a high-performance coach.”
TOTAL DISTRACTION
At the other end of the spectrum is Hodgson, who sees dealing with the media as a total distraction to his main job of coaching.
“It was something which demanded of me qualities I don’t naturally have,” Hodgson said of his days in the media spotlight as England manager.
Former England cricket captain Mike Atherton explained to Percival how he was “deliberately bland” in press conferences.
“Almost everything they write about a captain is driven by results so I considered it irrelevant and wouldn’t play their game,” he said.
Atherton’s approach seems somewhat ironic now he has become one of the world’s most highly-regarded cricket journalists.
Percival thinks the number of interviews Premier League soccer managers are now obliged to do can be excessive, calling it a “treadmill of platitudes”, but declines to blame media training for the routinely appalling “footballer-speak” interviews given by players.
“The fear of saying something that becomes a negative headline makes them tighten up,” he said. “It’s also linguistic convergence – they learn what ‘a football interview’ sounds like, and they mimic it.
“Where journalists get frustrated is the risk‑avoidance element. That’s where players close down but when someone like (Arsenal’s England midfielder) Declan Rice comes along — articulate and engaging — he really stands out.”
As the book title suggests, Percival has an intriguing section on the concept of “on/off the record” which, as he illustrates with a series of classic examples, means different things to different people in different places.
The current fashion for news organisations to tell readers they “understand” something is happening is merely their way of delivering information someone has given them “for background”.
Why this has become so prevalent is anyone’s guess and the practice has become so ludicrous that it is now not unusual for press officers to reply to queries by saying: “Off the record, we will not be commenting on this.”
The winners of the 2026 Charles Tyrwhitt Sports Book Awards are announced on May 21.
(Reporting by Mitch Phillips, editing by Ken Ferris)
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