Originally Posted by
Eric the Half a Bee
I can only think this is due to ITV cutting their football budget. They have very little football any more that it's hardly worth them having their own in-house team. Host Mark Pougatch is a freelancer. I would guess Matterface is freelance as well, maybe contracted to Talksport.
Roll back the years; just about all of the ITV regions had their own commentators, sometimes two or three. 28 years ago they were the biggest provider of football in the UK. Now they only have England games and Champions League highlights. England games used to be tied up in the same rights package as the FA cup, but the FA cup wasn't profitable to ITV, so they got the FA to split the package.