The Sun published a wholly fictitious article this morning saying that Celtic has agreed to sell Moussa Dembele.
The writer – Alan Nixon – is claiming an exclusive on this one.
That’s pretty easy to do when your article includes not one quote, not even one of those blind, unattributed, “club insider” ones.
It contains not one verifiable fact.
A good editor would never have agreed to its publication. Not in a million years.
The Sun is not a newspaper known for high journalistic standards, or an over-reliance on frivolous nonsense like facts, but even The Daily Record might have balked at publishing unsubstantiated crap like this. How can you have a major exclusive which is based on nothing weightier than a fart in the wind?
In another media climate – one which was based on provable facts and verifiable evidence – their rivals would be all over this, calling it a joke. Remember those days? Remember when the hacks and their papers used to beat each other up over this? Why did they stop that?
I know when they stopped it – they stopped it when we came along – but it kept at least some of them honest. They’re not as afraid of us as they are of each other, and so many of them simply write whatever crap they like now and know their rivals won’t contradict it.
The article opens thus; “Celtic are ready to sell striker Moussa Dembele to a Premier League club — and are looking for his replacement.”
That’s it. It goes on to talk about his form, his admirers and then there are a couple of paragraphs about Dominic Solanke and our reputed interest in a Spaniard, Dani Gomez, a youth player at Real Madrid. There is no supporting information or evidence for any of this.
No interviews. No quotes. No secret documents. Nothing at all.
This looks to me, for all the world, like this guy was sitting at his desk, with nothing to write, and a deadline to meet and who decided to invent a story instead of finding one. I say that without reservation although it’s a heavy allegation. There’s nothing to suggest it isn’t. This ought to be filed under fiction. Short fiction. The article is less than 300 words long.
A fanzine would turn this garbage down. E-Tims at least jokes about having sources! (Love you guys, as you well know!) They actually do source much of what they write. In contrast this is a writer on a national title who hasn’t even bothered to pretend he does.
Brendan has said this won’t happen. Moussa has said this won’t happen. There is no pressure to sell either from the board or from the player. It is ludicrous that these stories keep popping up. But this one is the worst in a while, because it doesn’t even try to be more than just speculation.
The paper should be ashamed to run such nonsense.
But, of course, this is The Sun, the newspaper which practically pioneered shameless “journalism.”