Talking On The Job: Daniel McDonnell

This is the first in a new series, in which we speak to established journalists in and around Ireland. We discuss what sparked their interest in the profession, their career path, experiences and advice to aspiring young journalists.

In our first feature, we spoke with Irish Independent football correspondent Daniel McDonnell.

Where did your interest in journalism stem from?

I’m not sure I recall specifically. I grew up in a house where there was a big interest in sport and I was encouraged to read the newspaper from a very young age. So, I was always interested by the people who wrote about sport and, sad as it may sound, I do recall keeping copybooks where I would record football results and things like that. I didn’t have any journalists in my family or any connection that way, but once I started reading I would always flick to sports pages and ask for sports books.

From those beginnings, was your path in school aimed towards studying journalism?

Sort of. By my mid-teens, I was fairly sure that I wanted to go down the journalism route after school. But by that stage, I’d started going to Dundalk games every week and had decided to set up a website — in the early days of the internet age — which basically functioned as a Dundalk news site with match reports etc. I don’t think I missed a game home or away in my final two years in secondary school, which meant taking quite a few half-days on Friday to travel around the country. My dad was the school principal so I managed to get away with it! He told me years later that he didn’t fancy the idea of me studying journalism as a standalone subject so he reckoned it might be for the best that I wasn’t too focused on the Leaving Cert — hence he was relaxed about the days off. Sure enough, my results were miles below expectations and I didn’t get the journalism course I wanted so I ended up heading for Arts in UCD instead.

Was Arts worthwhile?

I had a great time in UCD, I went for History and Politics and I suppose they are good subjects from a journalism perspective as there’s a current affairs edge and the various projects tend to involve sitting down and writing. But the extra-curricular stuff was of most benefit career wise. UCD had a very active student media in those days; there’s two on-campus newspapers and I ended up getting heavily involved with one of them — the College Tribune. I was sports editor for a year while I was doing my finals and then took a sabbatical year to edit the paper full-time — that included getting the advertising, organising printers and doing whatever was necessary to try and pay the bills. A labour of love but that was my journalism degree right there. There’s quite a few people who were active in the UCD student media back then that are working in journalism now.

I’m glad I went that way as it gave me the option of something to fall back on if it didn’t work out. I think that’s the problem with journalism degrees; I know plenty of people who did them that subsequently found that journalism wasn’t the life for them — and then what do you do? A lot of people do their journalism degree, get a placement somewhere and if it doesn’t work out — or if that workplace doesn’t have something for them beyond the end of their placement — then where do they go? I would always advise getting practical experience in journalism as the way to go rather than studying it. I think it’s a job where you have to sink or swim by learning the hard way and getting out and about — sitting in a classroom is no substitute.

So going to a college that has student newspapers or chipping in with your local paper or a website that accepts submissions — that can be really beneficial because when you see a printed piece of your work, you will spot the mistakes fairly easily. And if that publication gives you a wordcount and a tight deadline, then you’re getting a much more helpful insight into the realities of the game than studying the subject.

For people who haven’t had or won’t have the opportunity to go to college, would you give similar advice. Row in with a local paper?

Absolutely. There may be little or no money in it — but I find that sports desks will judge you on the quality of your work and your ability to cope with deadlines, wordcounts etc. So, go wherever you can to get that experience.

So, after the Tribune where did you go?

I sent emails to a list of sports editors around the country trying to advertise myself but only a handful got back to me. The Irish Star had just started a Sunday edition and I contacted them at the right time as they had a placement cropping up for the summer — this was 2004. I had decided to do a Masters in Politics as well from September so I worked in the Star Sunday for three months and then stayed on there doing a couple of days per week while I was doing my Masters. I then started picking up some freelance work because my Star work got my name out there on the beat; I finished up my Masters in 2005 and had picked up enough work that I was then able to go full-time as a freelance.

The Star was my main source of income but I was doing League of Ireland matches for pretty much all of the national newspapers — I would try and pick the game in Dublin that was the lowest profile in the hope that the staff reporters from newspapers wouldn’t be working there. That meant there would be more freelance work there for the likes of myself. I remember Cork and Derry going for the league title in 2005 was good for business because it took most of the lads out of Dublin. I think the night they played the title decider at Turner’s Cross, I was at Richmond Park doing Pat’s-Longford for all of the papers. I’d say the longest report was around 200 words but it was a lucrative night’s work.

So, you have to box clever too?

Yes. I would encourage people to try that route but the caveat here is that the market has changed a lot in the 12 years since then. The Star Sunday isn’t around now. Some of the papers that used to give me a lot of work back then have subsequently cut their budget for freelance writers. I was able to make a living pretty much working solely as a football freelance whereas starting off now I think you’d have to be willing to cover all sports — I think I did one rugby match and a handful of GAA games and that was it.

What’s your take on the standard and quantity of what’s out there?

There is a lot of content out there but the quality is also there if people know where to look for it — or want to. As it happens, if you look back through the archives, there was undoubtedly some great journalism but sports sections were often smaller. There’s a greater range of stuff covered now, although I suppose the debate over quality and quantity comes in here. Again, it comes down to the desire of the reader and the mindset of the companies that produce content.

I know that people will tell you that everyone is now reading on their phone and wanting to consume their news in shorter bites and, of course, there’s logic in that. You can’t dispute that a lot of young professionals get their news that way. But I still think there are people out there who desire the longer read, the well- researched and detailed piece of journalism that requires a bit of time to digest. Or just an entertaining piece that goes beyond the ‘hilarious’ headline and soundbite.

Is confidence an issue for you? Will you appear likeable to an interviewee? Will you ask the right questions? Will you connect?

I wouldn’t worry too much about that; all I would say is the value of a face to face interview can’t be underestimated. If you catch a footballer on the phone, it’s fairly hard to strike up a rapport. Face to face, you can at least try and strike some common ground. But sometimes it just doesn’t go well, that’s the way it goes.

Fair enough, but you’re at a point where I’d say confidence isn’t an issue. Did you get to that point by always being informed? Is that the key?

Ah I don’t know about that at all. What you must remember is that if you’re chatting to a young enough footballer, they are probably more nervous about chatting to you as they could be afraid of slipping up and saying something daft — especially if you are talking to a fella based in England who might be media trained to within an inch of his life or have a press officer hovering nearby. It’s different with a more experienced lad or a manager; in that case you probably need to have your facts straight in case they bring the discussion in a different way to what you’ve intended. Honestly, though, these days the problem is getting the good interviews — not knowing what to do when you get them. But I appreciate how it might be different for someone starting out.

How do you get the good interviews? Not the connection because I think that’s not the hard part. But getting someone to drop their guard and talk frankly, with insight and eradicating soundbites drilled into them?

I think every person is different, as cliched as that sounds — you can speak to lads for 15/20 minutes and get nothing. I wouldn’t claim to have mastered it either. It does help if you’ve met the person a few times before and they trust you a little bit. And a big thing would be to really research the subject, so you know something different about their background, where they are from, something they might have done before they were famous. Maybe speak to someone that knows them beforehand who might give you a bit of an insight. Rather than just hitting them with the predictable stuff that everyone asks them.

Because doing that shows a sincerity, doesn’t it? I mean, if you think of it from their perspective, it is flattering that someone has prepared in advance of holding a conversation with you.

Yeah maybe so, or maybe they’re just bored of answering the usual stuff and go into auto-pilot mode.

You do different things. The radio, podcasting etc. Is that the lot of the modern journalist? A want and an ability to diversify?

It goes back to what I was saying earlier about the freelance journalists today needing to cover more than one sport. I think the modern journalist does need to be able to diversify — whether it be radio or podcasting or whatever it might be. Sure, there will be senior journalists now who don’t necessarily need to do that because their reputation speaks for itself. But if you’re relatively young, I think you need a few strings to your bow. There’s an element of self-promotion there that might sit uncomfortably with people but it has to be done.

Even with all that, it’s so competitive. To even get a look in. Would your advice to those starting out be to have a really thick skin?

I just think my advice would be to never say no to any gig. That’s the main thing. I think one of the biggest problems with people trying to break into the game now is that they are trying to emulate some of their journalistic heroes instead of learning the basics themselves. You have to be prepared to go to the lowest profile game, with ten men and a dog there, and be prepared to cover that for buttons instead of thinking that, suddenly, the world wants to read your 1,000 word thesis on Pep and Klopp. There’s hundreds and hundreds of other people out there doing that; writing an opinion piece on their blog and thinking that someone is going to just take that and publish it.

But if someone is asking for advice on how to get into a more ‘traditional’ journalistic gig, I think working your way up slowly is the only way.