Sports commentators you like/dislike

[JackFrost]

I know there was a pundit one like this on here recently so I'd thought I'd start one relating to commentators

 

Like

 

Murray Walker (ex-F1) - Yes he got things wrong towards the end of his career but after 50 years commentating and being in his mid 80s who can blame him? He could commentate on a snail race and make it exciting.

 

Martin Brundle (F1) - Vast technical knowledge and always on the ball

 

John Gwynne (PDC Darts) - Just so unique in his style.

 

Peter Alliss (Golf)- Not a big fan of golf, but his voice goes so well with the TV coverage. If you r one of the few that don't find golf boring it's almost meditation.

 

Brian Moore (Rugby) - He does moan a bit but can be very humourous and does know the technicalities and laws of the game inside out. Considering he's also a fully qualified solicitor and manicurist as well as an England International, he deserves a hell of a lot of credit after disclosing today that he suffered sexual abuse as a child.

 

Jonathan Pearce (Football) - Prefer him to most other football commentators

 

 

 

Dislike

 

Tony Green (BDO Darts) - an old prejudiced 80s relic who pretends the PDC doesn't exist, some of his classics last year included, "Eric Bristow won the world title 5 times, I don't think it'll ever be repeated", (Player requires 78) "he might go 25 and bull here", (Player requires 3) "I wonder which way he'll go". Has to be the worst commentator out there at the moment

 

Clive Tydlesley (Football) - Irritating, can't stand his "On that night in (insert European capital city here)"

 

Sid Waddell (PDC Darts) - Yes he has immense knowledge of the game but he's past his sell-by-date and rants on and on about Taylor even when he's not playing in the match he's commentating on

 

Motson & Lawrenson - The worst double act to commentate on England games

 

Jacqui Oatley - The woman who did commentary on MOTD, I have no problem with female football commentators but one would expect any football commentator (regardless of gender) to have some form of commentating talent

 

They are all the ones I can think of currently

[Guest Dark Sotonic Mills]

Dislike.

 

Stuart Hall. For every reason imaginable.

[St Landrew]

Dislikes.

 

John Motson. I've put up with that awful nerd for nigh on 35 years. Take him away as quickly as it is humanly possible. Worst ever.

 

Murray Walker. Murray has ALWAYS made errors in his commentaries, which I used to put up with, and thought a bit of fun. But when you get older, you tend to lose patience for this sort of thing, and besides, his 100 octane voice really started to annoy when all he could produce with it was yet more drivel. He is the originator of the Commentator's Curse.

 

Brian Moore. I know he's gone, and he was a nice bloke, but his commentaries were simply awful. I have the 1976 FA Cup final with his noise on it and it actually spoils the game, for me. At the time, I watched David Coleman, on the Beeb, and he was absolutely superb.

 

Likes:

 

David [1-0] Coleman. As mentioned above. Probably the most authoritive commentator ever. Retired when errors started to come into his commentary. For me, famous for... now McCalliog, upto the Stokes, who's onside... 1-0. Southampton go mad..!

 

Barry Davies. Undeniably versatile, and I don't think he ever made a commentary error. Often he would identify something correctly that viewers didn't, rather than the other way around.

 

Jonathan Pearce. The only football commentator who stands out, for me nowadays. Good, good analyser, and makes Motson sound like a complete horse's arse, by comparison.

 

Charlie Cox. Rumours abound that he won't be commentating in MotoGP this coming season, which will be a shame. Love the Aussie's corny humour, and the way he takes the p!ss out of co-commentator Steve [stavros, Oracle, Nostradamus, whatever] Parrish. But he has good knowledge too. Just right for the slightly less serious world of Grand Prix motorcycle racing.

[Gingeletiss]

Dislike Andy 'I know nothing about the laws of football' Gray, and on the radio, That bloody agitator Adrian Durum, he again talks absolute twaddle.

[Thedelldays]

good uns

 

Alvin Martin

Ray Houghton

Mark Saggers

Johnathon Pearce

Jon Champion

Most of the R5 Live bunch

 

dislikes

Alan Brazil

Adrian Durham

Clive "that night in..." tylesley

Martin Tyler

John Motson

[bridge too far]

Re David Coleman:

 

He lives (or used to live) quite near me on the outskirts of High Wycombe. I seem to recall that he was ill with dementia or something similar so I Wikied him but there's no mention of that.

 

The Wiki entry makes for quite interesting reading. I didn't realise he was an accomplished athlete or that he was awarded an Olympic honour. I do however remember his commentary on the Munich seige.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Coleman

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

Ian Wright was a breath of fresh air , a great player who knew what he was talking about but was still brave enough to speak his mind - 'one of us' as well if you get my drift . Can't understand why the BBC dropped him - too emotional I suppose .

 

There's something intensely annoying about Andy Townsend , he can stick his bloody 'tactics truck' right up his..........

[Thedelldays]

Ian Wright was a breath of fresh air , a great player who knew what he was talking about but was still brave enough to speak his mind - 'one of us' as well if you get my drift . Can't understand why the BBC dropped him - too emotional I suppose .

 

There's something intensely annoying about Andy Townsend , he can stick his bloody 'tactics truck' right up his..........

he left the BBC I think

[TheCholulaKid]

Alan Green. Arsehole. Thinks he's important because Ferguson hates him. Has nothing interesting to say - ever.

[benjii]

Alan Green is an ignorant ****.

[benjii]

Lol - great minds and all that!

[Thedelldays]

alan green is disliked by many of his peers in the industry...irish prat

[Julian H. Cope]

I quite like Alan Green.

 

Barry Davies is my favourite commentator ever, as well as Simon Holt for Ch4 Racing. Al Michaels & John Madden always made Sunday night football entertaining.

 

I dislike Tony Gubba and Archie McPherson as well as that awful Motson bloke.

[Master Bates]

Re David Coleman:

 

He lives (or used to live) quite near me on the outskirts of High Wycombe. I seem to recall that he was ill with dementia or something similar so I Wikied him but there's no mention of that.

 

The Wiki entry makes for quite interesting reading. I didn't realise he was an accomplished athlete or that he was awarded an Olympic honour. I do however remember his commentary on the Munich seige.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Coleman

 

I loved Coleman, still have a tape of saints goals from years back with him commentating.

[Crab Lungs]

Agree with many likes/dislikes so far, but another 'like' for me would be Ian Darke.

[Thorpe-le-Saint]

Cannot stand ANY commentator that says "Normal service is resumed" once Man U/Chelsea/Arsenal/Liverpool equalise/ re-take the lead after going a goal down.

[Atticus Finch of Maycomb]

I like all the Test Match Special commentators, even Geoff Boycott, who is actually my favourite. Not all that keen on Michael Vaughan as yet, mostly because he is quite a hypocrite, like said that Ian Bell should 'just go out and bat', as if its that easy, for Vaughan it certainly wasn't at times.

 

Jonathan Agnew is really good. So is Henry Blofeld and Chris Martin Jenkins.

 

Really hate Botham and Nassar Hussien on Sky Cricket. Both come over as t*ssers. And so does Atherton. I like Michael Holding though. Bumble is kind of a nothing man who makes a lot of mistakes.

 

Hate Stuart Hall. And Motson and Lawrenson. And Murray Walker.

[JackFrost]

Dislikes.

 

John Motson. I've put up with that awful nerd for nigh on 35 years. Take him away as quickly as it is humanly possible. Worst ever.

 

Murray Walker. Murray has ALWAYS made errors in his commentaries, which I used to put up with, and thought a bit of fun. But when you get older, you tend to lose patience for this sort of thing, and besides, his 100 octane voice really started to annoy when all he could produce with it was yet more drivel. He is the originator of the Commentator's Curse.

 

Brian Moore. I know he's gone, and he was a nice bloke, but his commentaries were simply awful. I have the 1976 FA Cup final with his noise on it and it actually spoils the game, for me. At the time, I watched David Coleman, on the Beeb, and he was absolutely superb.

 

Likes:

 

David [1-0] Coleman. As mentioned above. Probably the most authoritive commentator ever. Retired when errors started to come into his commentary. For me, famous for... now McCalliog, upto the Stokes, who's onside... 1-0. Southampton go mad..!

 

Barry Davies. Undeniably versatile, and I don't think he ever made a commentary error. Often he would identify something correctly that viewers didn't, rather than the other way around.

 

Jonathan Pearce. The only football commentator who stands out, for me nowadays. Good, good analyser, and makes Motson sound like a complete horse's arse, by comparison.

 

Charlie Cox. Rumours abound that he won't be commentating in MotoGP this coming season, which will be a shame. Love the Aussie's corny humour, and the way he takes the p!ss out of co-commentator Steve [stavros, Oracle, Nostradamus, whatever] Parrish. But he has good knowledge too. Just right for the slightly less serious world of Grand Prix motorcycle racing.

 

Of course how could I forget my favourite commentary partnership? Both Cox and Parrish are excellent in their own ways and the humourous banter between the two just makes the partnership.

 

Would be a massive shame if Cox stopped commentating on MotoGP

[JackFrost]

Apparently Steve Parrish is indefinitely banned from Macau.

 

According to Steve Hislop's autobiography, he accidentally blew up a brothel over there.

 

Practical joke that went awry.

Edited 2 January, 2010 by JackFrost

[ottery st mary]

Dislike Alan Green. and John Motson..very poor football commentators who boththink so much of themselves........Arrogant sods.

 

Like David Coleman..very knowledgeable in his day.

[Micky]

Worst commentator / summariser ever - Stuart Hall - talks total tosh should have stuck to IAKO.

 

Worst radio presenter - Adrian Durham - tries desperately to be interesting, topical, funny, contraversial yet fails (daily) on all counts and just comes across as a total dickhead.

[Arizona]

Like Jonathan Pearce, more for his days on Robot Wars than anything else.

 

Martin Brundle has to be my favourite commentator of all time though, the bloke has everything. Fantastic knowledge and experience of his sport, clearly and understandably translated to the audience. He also has the foresigth to see what is going to happen in a race, predicting drivers who will struggle with tyre wear, fall back etc. Even predicting accidents, such as Vettel and Kubica in Oz last season. Funny, is well respected throughout the paddock and his grid walks are brilliant.

 

Used to love Murray Walker too. He had such a fantastic energy in his voice, which made everything twice as exciting. My favourite moment was when Schumacher smashed into the back of Coulthard at Spa in '98. "Oh God!"

 

RE: Least favourites. Motty is a senile tool and Lawro is as bland as a beige Ikea wardrobe.

[Nexstar]

Seem to be a lot of these threads, but it still puzzles me as to how Mark Bright landed a job in commentary.

[Pat from Poole]

Seem to be a lot of these threads, but it still puzzles me as to how Mark Bright landed a job in commentary.

 

 

Completely agree, he's shocking.

 

Sid Waddell is my favourite commentator in sport, the only person who would make me want to watch a match regardless of who the players are. Clever bloke as well.

 

As for football, Barry Davies was my favourite commentator, and I must admit I really liked Ron Atkinson until his Desailly comment did for him. Some of his Ronglish stuff was legendary.

[Pat from Poole]

Dislike Alan Green. and John Motson..very poor football commentators who boththink so much of themselves........Arrogant sods.

 

Like David Coleman..very knowledgeable in his day.

 

 

John Motson treats the viewers as if they are 4 years old and know very little about football. Extremely irritating man who I think is also half-blind judging by some of the things he misses during a game.

[bridge too far]

Going back to Nasser - I'm watching the cricket right now and I have to say he's a very good looking, sexy bloke

[stevegrant]

Waddell would be tolerable if he could remove his head from Phil Taylor's arse.

[Ponty]

Waddell would be tolerable if he could remove his head from Phil Taylor's arse.

Bit muffled, is he?

[Pat from Poole]

Waddell would be tolerable if he could remove his head from Phil Taylor's arse.

 

 

I was somewhat amused by Sid's recent claim that Taylor is one of the top 5 sportsmen of all time. Very funny. Though I have to say I can see Taylor getting 20 world titles, which must be pretty rare for any sport.

[Foxstone]

For me, the greatest commentator by a country mile - Ever, is the great Bill MacLaren!

 

Never has the enthusiasm and objectivity of any one commentator enhanced the enjoyment of watching a sporting event so much.

[bungle]

Pat Summerall and John Madden. The greatest commentary team of them all. FACT.

[St Landrew]

I loved Coleman, still have a tape of saints goals from years back with him commentating.

 

Any chance of Youtubing them..?

[St Landrew]

It's amazing how you stumble across things and find coincidences. I was looking at some digital text on Freeview earlier, when I saw DJ Danny Baker interviewing Elton John [part of which is on the BBC Sport website]. In it he mentioned EJ's dad's brother, former footballer Roy Dwight, who played for Fulham alongside Jimmy Hill, Johnny Haynes, Bedford Jezzard [brilliant name], and other notables. So I went to find Roy Dwight on Wikipedia, and sure enough he was there. There was also a Youtube link to him on a MOTD programme being shown on Australian TV, as well. In it, he was being interviewed by Jimmy Hill [yes, his former teammate] as team manager of Tooting and Mitcham. But there were a few other interesting bits about the clip. They showed the contesting players for Goal Of The Month [it was 1975-76 or 1976-77] and the top two contesting goals were from Peter Osgood and Nick Holmes, both of Saints, at the time. Denis Law was the adjudicator, so of course, they came nowhere. But I did have a well, I'm blowed... moment.

 

And why is Tooting & Mitcham significant..? Just happens to be a former club of Michail Antonio. It's all wheels within wheels stuff.

[dubai_phil]

I like all the Test Match Special commentators, even Geoff Boycott, who is actually my favourite. Not all that keen on Michael Vaughan as yet, mostly because he is quite a hypocrite, like said that Ian Bell should 'just go out and bat', as if its that easy, for Vaughan it certainly wasn't at times.

 

Jonathan Agnew is really good. So is Henry Blofeld and Chris Martin Jenkins.

 

Really hate Botham and Nassar Hussien on Sky Cricket. Both come over as t*ssers. And so does Atherton. I like Michael Holding though. Bumble is kind of a nothing man who makes a lot of mistakes.

 

Hate Stuart Hall. And Motson and Lawrenson. And Murray Walker.

 

 

Through my work I was lucky enough to watch a Test Match Pak V Eng in Lahore about 8 years ago. Got to meet all of the Sky team at the time and even had the honour of sitting at the back of the box for one session (there were only about 6 England fans in the ground so wasn't THAT difficult to blag)

 

David Lloyd is really Bumble in real life, have told the story before of his shock when he found out how you could get beer in Pakistan.

 

Mark Nicholas being "upper class Mark", Ian Botham resetting Bumbles mobile to Polish Language (lol and yes we did help him sort it out)

Boycott was exactly what you'd expect, Mr Yorkshire (He got his bottle of Malt nicked at Lahore customs as did I) :mad:

 

Shame he "had a little bother" and tends to be on foreign tv these days (he's on our TV doing the Eng SA test ATM)

 

And Aggers, met him at the airport and sat next to him on the flight back to Dubai. You can almost just picture him asking the flying mattress (oops sorry air hostess) for a nice glass of Chardonnay rather than the Champagne in Business Class.

 

Thing was the cricket guys in real life are just like their personas when they commentate.

 

In football, loved Coleman & never understood why Barry Davies wasn't a National Institution, hated Motson.

 

These days we just get "The Premier League TV" commentators, some like Ian Darke are good but some are awful.

 

The best still alive? Richie Benaud (check out the Twelfth Man)

Before him? Jim Laker.

 

Best presenter, our local hero Rob McAffrey. You guys will never know it but he has done an amazing job down here for the past 4 years with Showtime, he changed the face and shape of our TV football (thank fook) we'll miss him when Abu Dhabi TV take over

[Kingsland Codger]

I'm from the John Arlott, Dan Maskell, Bill McClaren, Peter Allis era and so am very much in favour of the commentator who doesn't just know the names of the players and the rules of the sport but also has a grasp of the use of English and, at their best, were more poet than mere informer.

 

Arlott: (Describing a shot by Clive Lloyd) - Like knocking a fizzle-top off with a walking stick.

 

McClaren: (Describing constant swift recycling of the ball from successive rucks) - Like chocolate bars from a slot-machine.

 

I'm delighted to say the entire current TMS team continues to delight with Aggers and Boycott being a marvellous double-act. Andy Cotter does a good job on the BBC TV rugby, as does Iain Robertson on the wireless. Stuart Hall's match summaries are works of art.

[bridge too far]

I'm from the John Arlott, Dan Maskell, Bill McClaren, Peter Allis era and so am very much in favour of the commentator who doesn't just know the names of the players and the rules of the sport but also has a grasp of the use of English and, at their best, were more poet than mere informer.

 

Arlott: (Describing a shot by Clive Lloyd) - Like knocking a fizzle-top off with a walking stick.

 

McClaren: (Describing constant swift recycling of the ball from successive rucks) - Like chocolate bars from a slot-machine.

 

I'm delighted to say the entire current TMS team continues to delight with Aggers and Boycott being a marvellous double-act. Andy Cotter does a good job on the BBC TV rugby, as does Iain Robertson on the wireless. Stuart Hall's match summaries are works of art.

 

Thinking of John Arlott's voice, and wonderful Hampshire accent, takes me back to a time of hot summer days, the smell of mown grass, and watching my dad play in a cricket match.

 

I, too, love Stuart Hall's summaries - his use of English is outstanding.

[Seany S]

No hatred for Garth Crooks? The drivel that comes out of his stupid, bug eyed face makes me want to kill. Plus in the blackness stakes he makes Andi Peters look like Malcolm X. An utter ameoba.

[JackFrost]

Mark Bright does irritate me, he almost isn't a commentator he seems to think he's a teacher teaching the players how to play the game.

[St Landrew]

I did mean to find some commentating gaffs on Youtube, but I found this instead:

 

 

The Youtube caption says destroys. Although Motson is his usual wormy self, I don't think Brian does, but Cloughie was a total gem. That's why I've posted it.

[unionhotel]

I did mean to find some commentating gaffs on Youtube, but I found this instead:

 

 

The Youtube caption says destroys. Although Motson is his usual wormy self, I don't think Brian does, but Cloughie was a total gem. That's why I've posted it.

 

 

Brilliant! He was a definate legend.

[gaz]

I'm a motorsport fan so I have a view of that area:

 

Likes

- David Croft

- Anthony Davidson

- John Hindhaugh

- Ben Edwards

- Toby Moody

- Julian Ryder

- Martin Haven

- Jamie Whitham

- David Addison

- the whole FOX NASCAR team (Mike Joy, Larry McReynolds and Darrell Waltrip)

 

All have a deep understanding of what they are talking about, you know they are fans and racers away from the broadcast booth.

 

Dislikes

- Murray Walker (in his later years)

- Charlie Cox (''Nightmare in a bubble car'' every weekend)

- Tim Harvey (gets a bit star struck by some BTCC drivers, even though he's an ex-BTCC Champ)

- Carlton Kirby (no, please god no!)

- Paul King (''SEBastiAN LeOB!''.....''MARcus GRONholm'' etc etc).

- Jonathan Legard (he forgets he's on telly and not the radio, and tries to fill every second of airtime with inane talk: ''up the hill, round the corner, look at that'' etc etc).

 

And loads more I can't stand.