Ba-gain of the season article - PLEASE READ

[A_R 0]

Hello all,

 

As an aspiring sports writer I have recently produced an article for an online sports website about the success Demba Ba has had during his time at Newcastle.

 

In order to get it out there to as many people as possible I am calling on you, the fans, to spare just a few minutes of your time to take a look.

 

Any feedback would be very much appreciated and taken on board.

 

I apologise if this is posted in the wrong place but I simply wanted to bring the article to the interest of as many Newcastle United fans as possible.

 

Please follow this link to take a look:

 

http://www.sportinbr...n-of-the-season

[Monkeys Fist 43095]

Where's the Arena you mention?

[wykikitoon 20767]

There is nothing more annoying than "PLEASE READ"

[Monkeys Fist 43095]

Piss "takeing" Ba-stard!

 

 

[luckyluke 2]

Where's the Arena you mention?

 

Aye, he can fuck off.

[wykikitoon 20767]

Piss "takeing" Ba-stard!

 

 

[Guest CabayeAye]

Hey buddy, well done for actually submitting something. A few constructive points on this article:

 

 

 

 

 

With another goal and another fine display from Newcastle United striker Demba Ba against Champions Manchester United, many have described the frontman as the best piece of business made by a Premier League team this season, Ba none.

• The first bit before the comma is a bit too long and doesn't read well, consider taking out "Newcastle United Striker" since we all already know who he plays for.
  
• Two Ba based puns there with the Headline and "Ba none". Maybe keep the pun for the headline and keep the text formal(ish).
  

With his goal against United takeing Ba’s season tally to 15 and a string of quality performances alongside the goals, it is unbelievable that the "Toon Army" managed to snap the Paris born star up on a free transfer.

• taking, not takeing!!
  
• When writing about Man Utd playing against another 'United', don't call Man Utd 'United', it REALLY annoys the fans of that club!
  
• Use inverted commas (') for informal titles. Save quotaition marks (") for actual quotes, i.e. 'Toon Army' rather than "Toon Army", although Toon Army is a well established name, so shouldn't need inverted commas in this context.
  
• The second half of this sentence doesn't read well. This is probably due to speaking in past tense rather than present. Try something like "the fact that Pardew managed to snap the striker up on a free transfer has made his performances all the sweeter for the Toon Army."
  

After the £35m departure of fans favourite Andy Carroll to Liverpool last January, many thought Newcastle would struggle to maintain their Premiership status as they were left only with the goal scoring (in)capabilities of Peter Lovenkrands, Shola Ameobi and Leon Best.

• Fans' not fans.
  
• Try to avoid calling current players "incapabilities" (not sure if that's even a proper word!), it has potential to annoy fans and as a writer you should try to be impartial. It would be better to talk about recent form such as something like "being left with Lovenkrands, Shola Ameobi and Best who managed only 18 goals between them last season." Apart from this, the fact that they managed 18 goals last season probably invalidates your argument!
  

But hard working manager Alan Pardew rolled up his sleeves and got on with the task in hand, ultimately keeping the Magpies up with relative ease.

This was then followed by the promise of owner Mike Ashley that the funds generated by the sale of Carroll would be reinvested into Pardew’s transfer kitty, although anyone that has followed Newcastle closely enough under Ashley’s regime knows more than to trust his word.

• Don't start sentences woth And, But etc.
  
• The second sentence doesn't flow well and is too long. Break it up into two sentences by adding a full stop after kitty and make the second statement a new argument in itself.
  
• You would have to be careful with critisisms made depending who you were writing for. There's some pretty strong anti-Ashley stuff here and although probably true, this kind of opinionated journalism would be more suited to a red top style publication than an impartial news site such as BBC, ESPN etc.
  

Despite small amounts of cash being available, Pardew was forced to beg, steal and borrow in order to fill the gap vacated by Carroll, eventually uncovering the Ba-gain of the season.

Whilst the Senegalese international striker’s pre match ritual of drinking strawberry syrup may sound delusional, it certainly hasn’t hampered his performances for the toon.

• Again, try and avoid past tense here. It sounds like you are telling a story rather than sharing information. The balance between conveying emotion and wasting words on rhetoric is a fine one and depends on who you are writing for! Maybe I'm biased though, because the sort of written work I do day to day is technical report based and is aimed at being as brief as possible! Do whatever reads best for the target audience.
  
• That's a third Ba pun! Keep it to the headline!
  
• Although the strawberry syrup thing is funny, he didn't actually say it's a pre-match ritual, so be careful what you're saying. On the other hand, many journalists just make stuff up, so you may be OK here.
  
• Capitalise proper nouns, even informal ones such as Toon.
  

In fact, when you consider that Ba cost absolutely nothing and has scored 15 Premier League goals this season whilst Andy Carroll, Fernando Torres and Luis Suarez cost their respective clubs a combined fee of nearly £110m and have scored just 9 Premier League goals BETWEEN them this season, who would bet against Ba’s strawberry syrup remedy to be put on tap in time for the next home game at the Sports Direct Arena?

• Try and avoid wasted words that add nothing such as "In fact", "in all honesty" or "to be fair". You should NEVER write filler to get up to a word count. If any individual word doesn't add value to the story, get rid of it.
  
• This sentence is waaaaaay too long. Try and use a formula of short sentence followed by long followed by short and so on. If needs be, make a point, back it up with a fact or a quote and add comment or opinion if needs be.
  
• Many people will say avoid using figures for short numbers. Consider nine rather than 9.
  
• Avoid capitalising words for emphasis i.e. BETWEEN. The point is strong enough in lower case.
  
• The last bit is probably better as a statement not a question, so change how it reads and use a full stop rather than a question mark. Try and make it so the last few words sum up the artical and close the piece in some way.
  
• No need to say home game followed by SD Areaa, we all know that Newcastle play their home games at the SD Arena. Again, these are wasted words.
  

 

Please don't take this as critisism, it's just so you can see what you need to be aware of in the future. Also, don't take this as gospel. As I've previously mentioned, I tend to do technical writing where I have to fit a lot of information into a limited number of characters. The best piece of advice is to read each bit out loud as you write it. This way you will get a feel for whether it reads well. Also, get other people to check your work, they will spot stuff that you've missed (I can almost guarantee that I will have made many mistakes in my writing here! )

 

But keep working on it, your written work is much better than 99% of people who write on the internet and you're easily better than Alan Oliver!

Edited January 8, 2012 by CabayeAye

[A_R 0]

Hey buddy, well done for actually submitting something. A few constructive points on this article:

 

 

 

 

 

With another goal and another fine display from Newcastle United striker Demba Ba against Champions Manchester United, many have described the frontman as the best piece of business made by a Premier League team this season, Ba none.

• The first bit before the comma is a bit too long and doesn't read well, consider taking out "Newcastle United Striker" since we all already know who he plays for.
  
• Two Ba based puns there with the Headline and "Ba none". Maybe keep the pun for the headline and keep the text formal(ish).
  

With his goal against United takeing Ba’s season tally to 15 and a string of quality performances alongside the goals, it is unbelievable that the "Toon Army" managed to snap the Paris born star up on a free transfer.

• taking, not takeing!!
  
• When writing about Man Utd playing against another 'United', don't call Man Utd 'United', it REALLY annoys the fans of that club!
  
• Use inverted commas (') for informal titles. Save quotaition marks (") for actual quotes, i.e. 'Toon Army' rather than "Toon Army", although Toon Army is a well established name, so shouldn't need inverted commas in this context.
  
• The second half of this sentence doesn't read well. This is probably due to speaking in past tense rather than present. Try something like "the fact that Pardew managed to snap the striker up on a free transfer has made his performances all the sweeter for the Toon Army."
  

After the £35m departure of fans favourite Andy Carroll to Liverpool last January, many thought Newcastle would struggle to maintain their Premiership status as they were left only with the goal scoring (in)capabilities of Peter Lovenkrands, Shola Ameobi and Leon Best.

• Fans' not fans.
  
• Try to avoid calling current players "incapabilities" (not sure if that's even a proper word!), it has potential to annoy fans and as a writer you should try to be impartial. It would be better to talk about recent form such as something like "being left with Lovenkrands, Shola Ameobi and Best who managed only 18 goals between them last season." Apart from this, the fact that they managed 18 goals last season probably invalidates your argument!
  

But hard working manager Alan Pardew rolled up his sleeves and got on with the task in hand, ultimately keeping the Magpies up with relative ease.

This was then followed by the promise of owner Mike Ashley that the funds generated by the sale of Carroll would be reinvested into Pardew’s transfer kitty, although anyone that has followed Newcastle closely enough under Ashley’s regime knows more than to trust his word.

• Don't start sentences woth And, But etc.
  
• The second sentence doesn't flow well and is too long. Break it up into two sentences by adding a full stop after kitty and make the second statement a new argument in itself.
  
• You would have to be careful with critisisms made depending who you were writing for. There's some pretty strong anti-Ashley stuff here and although probably true, this kind of opinionated journalism would be more suited to a red top style publication than an impartial news site such as BBC, ESPN etc.
  

Despite small amounts of cash being available, Pardew was forced to beg, steal and borrow in order to fill the gap vacated by Carroll, eventually uncovering the Ba-gain of the season.

Whilst the Senegalese international striker’s pre match ritual of drinking strawberry syrup may sound delusional, it certainly hasn’t hampered his performances for the toon.

• Again, try and avoid past tense here. It sounds like you are telling a story rather than sharing information. The balance between conveying emotion and wasting words on rhetoric is a fine one and depends on who you are writing for! Maybe I'm biased though, because the sort of written work I do day to day is technical report based and is aimed at being as brief as possible! Do whatever reads best for the target audience.
  
• That's a third Ba pun! Keep it to the headline!
  
• Although the strawberry syrup thing is funny, he didn't actually say it's a pre-match ritual, so be careful what you're saying. On the other hand, many journalists just make stuff up, so you may be OK here.
  
• Capitalise proper nouns, even informal ones such as Toon.
  

In fact, when you consider that Ba cost absolutely nothing and has scored 15 Premier League goals this season whilst Andy Carroll, Fernando Torres and Luis Suarez cost their respective clubs a combined fee of nearly £110m and have scored just 9 Premier League goals BETWEEN them this season, who would bet against Ba’s strawberry syrup remedy to be put on tap in time for the next home game at the Sports Direct Arena?

• Try and avoid wasted words that add nothing such as "In fact", "in all honesty" or "to be fair". You should NEVER write filler to get up to a word count. If any individual word doesn't add value to the story, get rid of it.
  
• This sentence is waaaaaay too long. Try and use a formula of short sentence followed by long followed by short and so on. If needs be, make a point, back it up with a fact or a quote and add comment or opinion if needs be.
  
• Many people will say avoid using figures for short numbers. Consider nine rather than 9.
  
• Avoid capitalising words for emphasis i.e. BETWEEN. The point is strong enough in lower case.
  
• The last bit is a statement not a question, so use a full stop rather than a question mark.
  
• No need to say home game followed by SD Areaa, we all know that Newcastle play their home games at the SD Arena. Again, these are wasted words.
  

 

Please don't take this as critisism, it's just so you can see what you need to be aware of in the future. Also, don't take this as gospel. As I've previously mentioned, I tend to do technical writing where I have to fit a lot of information into a limited number of characters. The best piece of advice is to read each bit out loud as you write it. This way you will get a feel for whether it reads well. Also, get other people to check your work, they will spot stuff that you've missed (I can almost guarantee that I will have made many mistakes in my writing here! )

 

But keep working on it, your written work is much better than 99% of people who write on the internet and you're easily better than Alan Oliver!

 

Thank you very much for the detailed feedback.

 

I will definitely take it all on board.

 

As you can probably tell I am currently in my infancy with regards to sports writing but practice makes perfect as they say!

[Guest CabayeAye]

Sports writing would be an awesome job! Certainly more interesting than writing about boring 'proper' work stuff'

 

I mean people post their opinions on here for fun, imagine making a living off that...

[A_R 0]

Sports writing would be an awesome job! Certainly more interesting than writing about boring 'proper' work stuff'

 

I mean people post their opinions on here for fun, imagine making a living off that...

 

Exactly mate that's the idea!

 

Perfect job for anyone with half an interest in sport.

[ChezGiven 0]

Alex, I can only assume that you are eight years old and this is the first time that you've ever had to write an article in excess of 100 words. In which case, well done.

 

Should the above not be true then that is the worst piece of shit I've ever read. Honestly, is there a remotely original opinion or fact in there? It's not just a waste of my time but a waste of time of literally anyone who has the misfortune to read it. Die a horrible death.

 

Harsh but fair.

[Brock Manson 0]

You could maybe someday get a job thinking up the cheesy headlines that they use in the Sun.

[harrynufc 0]

 

Top man. Good feedback from your earlier post.