Big Interview: Colin Murray’s spreading the football gospel

He's not joking, Colin Murray is as passionate about the football league as he is about his beloved Northern Ireland and Liverpool.

The 42-year-old has been the face of the EFL for years, bringing highlights of more than 70 teams from across the country.

Either side of a three-year stint presenting Match of the Day 2, Murray was the main man presenting Football on 5 from 2006 to 2010 and since 2018 he's been on EFL on Quest.

But when asked if he's seen as the face of the EFL he took a modest approach.

"I just do my job, my life is very much just do my job and go home," he said.

It was the issues surrounding the football league that Murray was keen to touch on.

The last few months have seen Bury and Bolton facing financial issues, with the former being expelled from the football league.

And as Murray stood in a sports hall opposite Leyton Orient's The Breyer Group Stadium ahead of their clash with Walsall, he launched a tirade on the "vulture" owners that have destroyed historic clubs.

"We can't forget Bury for a start, it's a month on and the national media have forgotten them," he added.

"We need to have the deterrents in place to that stop vultures taking over football clubs.

"I think football grounds should be like National Trust buildings.

"We protect these buildings in the middle of forests but we don't protect these buildings that are the centre of a community.

"You should not be able to take over a club and mortgage and sell off car parks, training grounds and the ground itself – that is the club, that is there in stone.

"Money should not be allowed to be moved from one company to another company owned by the owner under the pretence that they're going to save money in tax.

"More often than not that money never comes back to the club and that's where it gets in problems.

"It's a bit like climate change, you need drastic action now, there's no point just papering over the crack.

"Lets trust the fans, why should fans rally around their clubs when they go out business.

"The fans will always protect their clubs, so give them a platform to do that.

"This is the mistake, everyone thinks fans are only in this to get to the Premier League, that's not true.

"They're not just there to win leagues and for the glory, they're here win or lose and the one thing they want is a club that is not in millions of pounds of debt, that may disappear from the community.

"We have to put those deterrents in to stop the vultures in the first place.

"The selling of grounds, I think that's absolutely terrible."

Surrounded by children kicking football's around the sports hall, Murray kept interrupting himself eating a Leyton Orient-decorated doughnut to pour out pure emotion on the importance of football league clubs.

It's flawed, it causes agony and heartbreak as well as unbelievable excitement and exhilaration.

And in Murray's words, "that has to be protected."

"Modern day football is protecting the pyramid, there's nothing like it in the world," he said.

"I've been to football in the third tier in Portugal and Spain and believe me it's a world away.

"If you were to get a map and dot every single ground down on the football pyramid, take you down into the National League.

"Down to National League North and South, down to the Isthmian League's and you dot it all together and drew a line, it's like the arteries of communities all joining together.

"It literally fills the entire map, it's like an electric grid that lights up.

"That has to be protected.

"There's so much more to football than just one division and while that division is thriving around the world, it would be an absolute disaster if we didn't have our promotion and relegation system.

"Is it flawed? Yeah of course it is, there's loads of things that could be better but there's loads of things with it that are bloody right though."

And for the Northern Irishman, from Dundonald on the outskirts of Belfast, his life revolves around these clubs.

EFL on Quest has been running since 2018, with Murray at the helm, and bridges that gap to give fans coverage of the lower leagues.

And it's fair to say that Murray is proud of what the show has achieved.

"I love it as a job," he added.

"There's no comparison that can be made between us and Match of the Day, the budget we have is minimal compared to that.

"There's more than 70 teams and five of us in a room trying to keep across everything.

"Our golden rule is that we won't get it right every time but don't be generic.

"Let's not be generic about football clubs, I don't like that at all.

"If we're going to spend a minute today talking about Oxford United, make sure when you come in you know who the top scorers are.

"Know what the deal is with the club, what the fans are thinking and that's what we try and do.

"It's taken people a while to get their heads around that.

"Just because you played well this week doesn't mean we'll necessarily talk about you if we talked about you last week.

"Our view is that every one of the teams is important.

"We love it, it's 9pm every Saturday when before it could fall foul to being midnight, how is that any good to the kids watching?

"Usually the EFL goes on holiday during international break, we won't get as many ratings without the Championship but that's not the point, we still cover the teams that are playing."

Colin Murray EFL presented Quest live from Leyton Orient's The Breyer Group Stadium on Saturday October 12. Watch all the highlights every Saturday at 9pm. Also available via desktop and app on QuestOD.