Hearsay or crystal ball?

Back in the mists of time — 4 November 2010 to be precise; less than a week ago — Michael Gleeson wrote this in The Age:

[Mark] Thompson is expected to be appointed by Essendon this week, probably today, in an assistant coaching role with the Bombers after quitting the Cats on October 4.  . . . Essendon is understood to have only been waiting on chief executive Ian Robson to return to work before making the announcement.

Less than a week later on 8 Nov, via AAP, The Age reports:

James Hird says it would be great to have Mark Thompson join his new-look Essendon coaching staff, while insisting the two-time Geelong premiership mentor has yet to sign a deal with the Bombers.

To be fair, Gleeson’s report did include a little uncertainty — expected, probably today, understood. Nevertheless, merely four days later it looks more like soothsaying than reporting.

Again, to be fair to Gleeson, there has seemed to have been a certain amount of Machiavellian smoke around Windy Hill over recent months. Nevertheless, there’s an indecent distance between probably today and what has eventuated.

We don’t think it’s too much to expect reporting in the mass media to have more credibility than Julius Caesar reading the auguries as favourable before proceeding to the Senate on the Ides of March.