Peter Corrigan: Pundit can show Sven the discomfort zone

Few men divide opinion in this footballing nation more deeply than Terry Venables, and the call he answered last week to become manager of Leeds United has ensured that the five weeks which separate us from the start of the Premiership will be full of fascinating anticipation.

It is hard to imagine another managerial appointment that could have stimulated as much interest. Neither are there many player transfers that would have excited more comment. Come to that, there haven't been many transfers of any description – a result, according to Arsène Wenger, of the game's precarious finances – and were it not for Venables we would be happily wallowing in the football-free zone between the end of the World Cup and the mid-August start to the winter hostilities.

That brief break is now being consumed with speculation about Venables' reign at Leeds. Will he be able to keep Rio Ferdinand? Does he have the ability to mould and motivate a squad whose potential was blunted by their problems last season?

Since it seems unfashionable to occupy a neutral position, let me confess to an admiration of his approach to the game that dates from his young playing days at Chelsea. I would not qualify as being one of his cronies (I don't recall speaking to him during the last 15 years), but I like him.

He is not without his faults. He has an entrepreneurial streak he could do without, a vision of running a club in its entirety that I am not sure is workable, and a record of misadventure in the business world.

He has been likened to Arthur Daley; a comparison that may not be flattering but, to my mind, does not condemn him. It has been enough, however, to turn many against him, not least past high-ranking members of the Football Association, who made sure that his reign as England manager was not as long and as free from aggravation as it should have been.

They say he carried too much "baggage", a phrase repeated frequently last week, and used as a justification to belittle him at every opportunity. I must find this moral high ground one day, it must be much easier to write from there.

Unfortunately, to carry the opinion that Venables was clumsily handled by certain people at the FA and that this harmed the cause of the England team has now gathered the extra dimension that we begrudge Sven Goran Eriksson's presence as manager of England. It is even said of Eriksson's detractors that they dislike him because he is a foreigner.

I don't class myself as such. He has yet to convince me that he possesses all the qualities his admirers assign to him, but his nationality doesn't offend me. I'm a Welshman, and if I can put up with a Kiwi managing our rugby team I can certainly tolerate a Swede in charge of the English football side. The anti-Venables faction will, no doubt, be awaiting the season with unexpected eagerness because they want to see the Venables coaching reputation crushed once and for all.

No opportunity has been lost in certain newspapers over the past week to question his credentials. When they haven't been outlining his previous form as a businessman they've been picking over his coaching achievement with a pair of sterilised tongs and condemning with faint praise or even no praise at all.

That's why I think Venables' decision to re-enter the fray is highly courageous. Whatever the quality of the squad he inherits, transforming Leeds into a trophy-winning team in the small timescale he will be allowed is a huge task. The prospect of watching him try is enough of a reason to want the season to hurry up. It does no harm that there are other considerations over which to mull.

His presence on the active scene will do nothing to relieve the pressure on Eriksson's tenure at the England helm. Indeed, it is interesting to note that for the very first time no fewer than five Premiership clubs are now in the charge of former England managers: Venables, Sir Bobby Robson at Newcastle, Kevin Keegan at Manchester City, Graham Taylor at Aston Villa and Glenn Hoddle at Spurs.

Not for one minute do I suggest that Eriksson will get anything but the fullest co-operation from each one – even though he is enjoying a measure of control and a security of tenure that none of them experienced.

Another appealing part of Venables' bravery is that he was so willing to step out of that most comfortable of chairs in which sits the television pundit.

The World Cup put a wide range of sages on parade. Deciding who was best is a personal preference, but I'm inclined to agree that Venables offered the most accurate and persuasive opinions.

It was a job he could have continued for years to come, and every proclamation would have confirmed his reputation as an expert. Now that reputation will depend solely on the efforts of those he sends out to do battle for Leeds. Two of his fellow veteran World Cup pundits, Robson and Taylor, are already embroiled in the action. Venables' decision to join them adds an enthralling extra dimension to the drama.

Trevor deserves better

"Slack, slovenly and supine" – this alliterative insult was not used to describe England's second-half performance against Brazil nor, indeed, to sum up the support sport has received from successive governments over the years. The words were part of a report issued last week by the all-party House of Commons Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport and were aimed at Sport England's performance in monitoring the progress of the Wembley Stadium project.

This is the fifth report in three years that MPs have made on Wembley, and on each occasion it has been a case of being wise after the non-event. Why they have come up with another when we are at last in sight of a start on the new Wembley is difficult to judge. But this time they have shouldered aside all others whose incompetence has made a valid contribution to the mess and singled out Sport England to be made the scapegoat.

My colleague Alan Hubbard has been keeping a much closer watch on the behind-the-scenes machinations of this long and sorry affair and reports accordingly on Page 2.

I just have two points to add. Trevor Brooking does not deserve to carry the Wembley can into his retirement as chairman of Sport England after the Commonwealth Games. When it comes to openness and integrity, the choice between Brooking and many of the other characters who have been involved in the various stages of the farce wouldn't detain anyone for long.

The major point the politicians never tire of repeating is the £120 million of Lottery money that Sport England initially allocated to Wembley, chiefly for the purpose of acquiring the site.

This is constantly referred to as a waste of public money, but if a stadium is to be at Wembley then this was necessary expenditure, and demands that it should be returned are nonsense.

The argument is that football is a rich enough game and doesn't deserve Lottery funding. But the stadium is not being built for the players, nor for millionaire chairmen, but to allow fans to sit in comfort to watch their national team. Since football supporters form by far the country's largest sporting audience and get neither subsidy nor sympathy from anyone, they are surely entitled to the benefit of Lottery proceeds to which they are probably the biggest contributors.

That this right should be challenged by representatives of a House renowned for finding drains down which to pour our money – please don't make me mention the Millennium Dome – is colossal impudence. They have a nerve even to comment on sport.

One day some literary genius will create the right phrase to sum up the contribution that Parliament has made to the sporting life of this nation. Slack, slovenly and supine will come nowhere near it.