TV VIEW/Philip Reid: On a dank and grey Saturday, the shortest day of the year, it can do the heart good to simply give in, to forget about shopping and to grab the remote control and, well, put the feet up and, er, relax.

Especially when the kids are overdosing on chocolate and a magician's conjuring at their football club's Christmas bash. A new winter sport has developed in our house which involves a dash for the zapper and this balding forty-something usually loses out, with the result MTV blares out from the screen rather than sport.

So, with the kids away, you'd think it was the ideal chance to play, wouldn't you? Ah, if only. The Saturday before Christmas is not a day to hold much sporting cheer on the goggle box and, to be honest, the only real fun and games to be had was to watch, or rather listen, to some washed-up old soccer professionals on Soccer Special on Sky Sports.

Now, I'll admit, anyone who can spend the afternoon reclining as a couch potato watching this show should definitely have the men in white coats coming to take them away but, in the interest of research - and sheer laziness - so it was that the final countdown to when the evenings start to brighten again was spent in such a fashion.

This is a programme that features live coverage of the day's football across channel, with the exception that you don't see a ball kicked in anger. Instead, the presenter Jeff Stelling - he of the endless statistics - is surrounded by former professionals who have headphones over their greying barnets and who watch their respective matches on monitors and inform us about what is happening in soccer's big games.

On Saturday, the younger generation wouldn't have the foggiest idea who most of the in-studio experts were; we had Rodney Marsh, Gordon McQueen, Nigel Spackman and Charlie Nicholas. Out of the studio, other former professional players - Alan McInally, Alan Smith and Chris Kamara, all of whom revelled in cliches - were used as match "reporters".

The only requirement is that the voice must rise in tempo as the report progresses, presumably to heighten the viewers' interest . . . or, maybe, it's just to wake them up from their slumbers.

In many ways, it's like radio on television - except that you can watch the contorted facial expressions of the experts. In this madcap form of conveying what is happening, there is also the propensity for someone watching one match to inadvertently shout out while someone else is talking.

This happened repeatedly on Saturday, but mostly when Nicholas (or was it Spackman, or maybe McQueen?) - it is easy to lose track - was reporting on his match, sounds from elsewhere in the studio gave the impressive that some form of bedroom aerobics was under way as guttural sounds of "Oh Nooo!" and "Ooohhh!!!" woke everyone up.

We soon discovered there was no hanky panky going on. It was just Marsh losing the run of himself as he watched Leeds United throw away their lead in allowing Southampton's Fernandes snatch a late, late equaliser. Of course, in the format of this programme, we didn't get to see the actual goal . . . and we had to wait until Network 2's The Premiership later that evening to see just why Marsh got so hot and bothered. And, to be fair, maybe he was justified.

Sympathy for the plight of Leeds manager Terry Venables was in short supply in the RTÉ studio, though. There was little or no sign of Christmas spirit as the two hardest-hitting pundits on the box got stuck into El Tel. Peter Collins took the chair to feed morsels to Eamon Dunphy and John Giles, not that they needed much encouragement to let their views be known that Venables' time at Elland Road is likely to have a shorter life than a turkey on Christmas Day.

Dunphy told us there were "massive" problems for Venables. "The players don't want to play for him. I think the supporters are getting at the players and I think there is a real crisis," he insisted, although he added they would probably stay up as "there are worse sides below them". But he added: "Given the quality of players they have, and their aspirations at the start of the season, (remember) Leeds were top of the table after four or five matches, this is (already) a very bad season for them."

Collins wondered would Venables go at the end of the season, to which Giles, a former Leeds hero, said, "I don't think you have to wait until the end of the season, Peter. I think his job is on the line now."

Dunphy expanded his theory that Venables simply isn't up to it after five months at Leeds.

"He hasn't been able to impact in the dressing-room," said Dunphy. "It's a question of whether he walks or they sack him, in my view. (And) I think he will stay to get his pay off."

In the end, it all comes down to money.