Sports Journalism – Written by Akul Dev

Sports journalism is everything to do with writing and reporting on all types of sports, both amateur and professional. It include jobs like

reporting game statistics, detailed preview of a game, post match analysis, interviewing players and coaches, conducting press conferences with team managers and offering commentary on television, radio and internet. Sports journalism helps in commercialising of a sport. More a sport is in news, more is its popularity.

In most cases, sports journalism is a department in a media companies and news channels. But there are some companies which only report on sports and its related events like ESPN, Sports Illustrated etc. With the advent of Internet and social media, live updates of matches and live streaming is provided by sports journalists to keep fans updated even if they are not able to watch a game.

Since sports involve outdoor activities, there is a lot of fieldwork in sports journalism. Reporters and journalists have to be at the stadium or sports complex to cover a game and report about the results back to their headquarters. Simultaneously, journalists have to interact with players and officials in order to know their opinion on the game being played. Nowadays media companies hire ex-sportspersons to do sideline reporting and commentary because they can relate more with the game going on and provide inputs for viewers to able understand the game better. It is important the game is being broadcast to people watching it on TV or internet. So camera men are integral part of this field. The photographers too help in capturing the special moments in a game with their high resolution cameras. These photos are later published with the articles to provide an aesthetic view to the reader.

Apart from this, investigative journalism too plays a part in sports journalism. Sometimes there are cases of cheating during a game, unfair decisions, controversies, corruption charges and scams which interfere with the true spirit of the game and taint the sport. Journalists have to investigate the real cause of such mis-happenings and report accordingly. The recent revelation of corruption in FIFA, the official body of football, is an example.

Many feel sports journalism is not serious journalism because it does not have to deal with politics, business, economics or security of a country. But it forms an important part of news reporting. Just like a hand cannot do anything without its little finger, sports journalism is important for a media company.

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