Voices of Rugby: Bill to Butler

Many of the clips I’ve included in this rugby memoir have focussed on great players doing great things. However, when watching them – as I did – via the medium of television, they were all accompanied by someone’s voice. As in any live TV sport broadcast, the commentator is crucial. Some are functional, forgotten as soon as they hand back to the studio. However, the best of them enhance the enjoyment, the sense of occasion with a witty turn of phrase or description of the action which complements the pictures perfectly.

For many years, rugby was synonymous with the brilliant Bill McLaren. All the iconic Five Nations matches had Bill at the microphone. With his immaculate Borders accent he was erudite, articulate and often playful. Remember, in the early days there were no pundits with who he could share the workload but even after eighty minutes I’d never tire of hearing his voice.

By the time he finally hung up his mic in 2002 aged 78, that wonderful diction was unsurprisingly just starting to fracture a fraction but the 2003 Six Nations seemed a tad empty without him. I’d taken him for granted. I loved those references, in response to a try, to the scorer’s home town with the joyful  “There’ll be dancing in the streets of (Ballymena/, Galashiels/insert place here)…” or, the more mundane lineout sequence such as “Murdoch throws, Martin palms, Wheel gathers” There was something warm and cosy on a cold winter’s afternoon about those commentaries and that still applies when listening to him on clips like this, from 1978.

Stay to the end and you’ll also be rewarded by a brief sign-off by Cliff Morgan, another mellifluous voice I associate with Seventies rugby. He’d been a Welsh playing legend, too, but his beautifully crafted reports were also broadcasting gold, especially on radio. He rarely carried a whole match and it was fortuitous that he was commentating in January 1973 for the thrilling Barbarians try against the All Blacks, culminating in the breathless “What a score!”

The line of rugby-related Welsh wordsmiths has continued with the wry Jonathan Davies, who cut his commentary teeth alongside McLaren, and the slightly older Eddie Butler, whose international appearances in the early Eighties predated Jonathan’s. The giant former back-row forward is a highly-respected journalist but his voice, whilst a tad harsher than Morgan’s, has in recent years also become part and parcel of TV sport. His measured delivery is also ideal for documentary voiceovers and promo sequences, even Pembroke Castle's welcome video! Whether the theme is medieval knights and Tudor kings or next week's Calcutta Cup battle, you can’t help but listen, spellbound.   

The Bard of Newport is also one half of the Beeb’s most entertaining double-act since The Two Ronnies. His deep lyrical timbre and hearty chuckle contrast so dramatically with Brian Moore that their on-air relationship is a key ingredient of the match. Butler portrays the kindly, erudite uncle while ‘Pitbull’ Moore is the naughty schoolboy railing against injustice. The ex-England hooker was wont to throw many punches during his career but now it’s his excitable verbal haymakers, often aimed at errant referees or daft players, which can irritate or resonate in equal measure. On occasions he has ‘lost it’ completely, especially when exasperated at England or a continually reset scrum. I used to hate hearing him moaning but now more often I found myself nodding in agreement. I’m just a Grumpy Old Man, too!

Ulsterman Jim Neilly and the BBC’s current Mr Versatile, Andrew Cotter provide complementary accents, but I’ve never had the need to tune into Five Live and hear the veteran Ian Robertson in full flow. I confess the ITV broadcasting team leave me completely underwhelmed, while the Anglo-centric pundit patrol, notably Wilkinson and Woodward, bore me to tears. It’s not that I dislike hearing English voices. Back in my dim-and-distant Rugby Special-viewing days, Nigel Starmer-Smith was the front man as well as ‘calling’ the live games McLaren couldn’t attend. Jeremy Guscott’s West Country burr makes a welcome change, while Gabby Logan is a very engaging presenter. I used to love John Inverdale’s laidback style on Five Live but he now seems a bit too associated with Twickers and the corporate RFU, even veering towards Alan Partridge territory. He does sport a nice line in natty scarves, though.

I always prefer my commentators neutral, which particularly seems to suit rugby, a sport where rival fans can mingle without trouble, anthems are respected and even a live cockerel on the Parc des Princes greensward was never ridiculed. The laissez-faire attitude towards on-pitch acts of grievous bodily harm doesn’t sit well with me, but international rugby will surely remain part of my winter weekend living room life.

The Voices of Football

The first people I associated with football were the guys on Grandstand, Match of the Day and The Big Match. It was perhaps more about the face than the voice. During the Seventies, Frank Bough was the anchorman, the one with the mic in his ear as the scores came in on a Saturday afternoon, and the bulky figure of Sam Leitch presided over the early afternoon Football Preview segment. However, David Coleman had wielded power at the Beeb for a long time, presenting Sportsnight on Wednesday evenings and commentating at all the major occasions, from the Olympics to Cup Finals. He possessed a natural, unflappable style, his voice rarely showing much emotion. He even had his own catchphrase: “One-nil”. No matter the circumstances or quality of the goal, the opener was invariably greeted with those two words.  Had he been at the mic for Man City’s injury time Premier League-clinching moment, instead of Martin Tyler’s ecstatic “Aguerooooooo” I daresay the astonishing season climax would be remembered for eternity for a flat, forlorn “3-2”.

On Sunday afternoons, we would tune to ITV for LWT’s The Big Match, presented by Brian Moore with the more opinionated Jimmy Hill adding his tuppence-worth at his side. Even when John Motson and Barry Davies took over as principal commentators on MOTD – and we would always watch the Wembley showpieces on the Beeb – I’d have to grudgingly admit that Moore was their superior. He combined the old-school voice of Coleman with knowledge not only of football but also what the football fan would be thinking and feeling.

I recall sometime in the early Nineties one lunchtime eating in Broadcasting House’s top-floor canteen – sorry, restaurant – when I observed at an adjacent table the holy trinity of Motty, Davies and Moore in conversation. Presumably they’d been involved in a Radio 4 programme but I’d love to have been close enough to eavesdrop on those three legendary voices.

For at least two decades, it felt that Motson, Davies and the equally versatile duo of Tony Gubba and Alan Weeks were permanent fixtures in the BBC commentary boxes, with Archie Macpherson’s cheery Scottish accent, warm coats and uncontrollable hair brought in for Celtic and Rangers fixtures. Motty may have become the favourite amongst ordinary fans but I have always found him too irritating, either stating the obvious or, increasingly, finding bizarre ways of doing so. Phrases along the lines of “Was that a foul?” or “Unless I’m very much mistaken that was a goalkeeping error” really irked me, and his bias during England internationals crossed the line. Of course that probably endeared him to many supporters but I prefer my commentators to play it straight, not to the gallery. He kept going until the age of 72, by which time his eccentricity had taken over. It was time to go.

One man I had heard on Channel 5, Jonathan Pearce, annoyed me even more. His sudden bursts of deafening exuberance whenever a goal was scored were such that when he moved to MOTD I was horrified. However, I learned to appreciate his commentaries and obvious affection for the sport to such an extent that since the Noughties he has been one of my favourite football voices.

There were many Saturdays when Dad tuned to BBC Radio’s live Saturday afternoon broadcasts for commentaries. Peter Jones - not the tall, suave Dragon’s Den squillionaire, I should add – was the main man for many years. Unlike his successor, Alan Green, Jones was universally popular until his untimely death in 1990 aged just 60. I also liked listening to the more distinctive voice of his contemporary, Bryon Butler.

These days I confess I struggle to identify the different commentators I hear on MOTD or Sky Sports. Like most commercial radio presenters, they seem to have been manufactured on the same assembly line somewhere in the Home Counties. It doesn’t make them bad at their job – far from it – but something unique, offbeat or any distinguishing feature would be welcome provided it wasn’t at the expense of professionalism or knowledge. I guess that’s why the sidekick has become integral to the commentary box experience. Putting aside their respective strengths and foibles, at least the likes of Mark Lawrenson, Glenn Hoddle and Alan Smith are easily recognisable.

It seems that a prerequisite for pundits and co-commentators is to have played the game at the highest level. I tend to disagree that only ex-internationals are qualified to voice sensible opinions on football. However, provided they are articulate with a neat turn of phrase and ability to bring their personal experience to bear, I have no objection. Some are really good, of course. It’s even reached the point that I forget that Lee Dixon, Danny Murphy or even Gary Lineker were once stopping, creating or scoring for the best clubs in the land.

For intelligent humour, I don’t think you can beat Jeff Stelling’s handling of Sky’s live Soccer Saturday. I never thought I’d heap praise on anything from the Murdoch stable but once I warmed to The Simpsons anything was possible. Stelling, his studio sidekicks and the location reporters now seem part of my extended family. They even include the obligatory eccentric, the one you can’t decide whether to love or hate. Chris Kamara just about sits in the former camp. His “Unbelievable, Jeff!” catchphrase is over-used but there’s always something to make you chuckle, even when the goal alerts at the foot of the screen show QPR going 2-0 down at home.

However, for outlandish whimsy I’d place Stuart Hall at the summit. I know he’s since been outed as a poisonous pervert but the former It’s a Knockout presenter was a football reporter par excellence. His summaries on BBC Radio were more Shakespearean soliloquy than post-match review, a few minutes of wondrous wordsmithery that made me want to stand and applaud instead of hang around for Six-O-Six.

However, perhaps the voice that became a greater part of my football-related TV life than any other belonged to a man you never saw until he died. I’m talking about Len Martin. For 37 years he read the classified results on Grandstand, and for me the score could not possibly be accepted as truth unless I’d heard it from Martin’s dulcet tones. For many, the greatest was James Alexander Gordon, Len’s counterpart on BBC Radio, or perhaps his successor Tim Gudgin, but for all the Moores and Motsons, Halls and Hills across the past fifty years, Len’s the boss!