Royston

[Rhodes]

'Pinging the lids' is a dog racing term meaning starting like a house on fire or hitting the ground running, surely you knew that

[Football Man]

Nope, I just place my bets and collect my winnings!

[Lato]

the only Pinging I know is from The Big Match circa late 70s when the great Huw Johns used to commentate on a shot (usually from Molyneux or the Baseball Ground) from distance with an elongated cry of "Piiiiiiiiiinnnnnngggg"

[Rhodes]

Lato - I think you will appreciate these two links from other Forums about football commentators, Huw Johns gets a mention as do all the other old favourites such as Clive Tydesley, Gerry Harrison, Guy Mowbray, Gerald Sindstat, Davie Provan, Brian Moore and the great David 'one nil' Coleman. I'll be interested to know who your all time favourite is and also your favourite piece of commentary:

 

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?p=11375032

 

http://www.redcafe.net/archive/index.php/t-55577.html

 

 

 

[Lato]

Huw Johns is my favourite commentator with Barry Davies a close second and I don't actually have a favourite piece of commentary by either of them or anyone else..except of course for the commentary of the 1973 England v Poland games.

[Horace]

It was Hugh Johns, not Huw. Oh to go back to those days!

 

[Rhodes]

Some of the commentaries during the 1970 World Cup in Mexico were classics and David Coleman was at his brilliant best for Brazil v England. I have to agree with Lato for once on Barry Davies who was always so cool calm and collected unlike his rival Motty who often got on your nerves.

[Horace]

You can actually remember them? How sad.

[Lato]

Yes rhodes I concur about Motson, I think he has gone on too long...him and Lawrenson are just a cheap music hall double act now. I usually employ the red button option and listen to radio 5...okay you have to put up with the opinionated rhetoric of Alan Green but you get Mike Ingram and John Murray who are both excellent.

 

David Coleman I always thought was overrated except for Chile v Italy in 1962 when his piece before the game is outstanding.

 

Horace it was of course Hugh not Huw but seen it spelt both ways though usually the former.

[Rhodes]

Originally Posted By: Horace

You can actually remember them? How sad

Horace - I thought you were 64, that makes you a lot older than me

[Horace]

I'm actually 63. Doesn't mean I can remember commentaries from 30 years ago!

[Wader]

Originally Posted By: Lato

Yes rhodes I concur about Motson,

"Well here we are at Wembley in front of a capacity crowd, which I must say Des very near fills the place"

Classic Motty.

Brian Moore my favourite. Not because he was good, but because his commentaries just bring so many memories flooding back of that era.

[Football Man]

Martin Tyler has always been the best, closely followed by Barry Davies. Brian Moore went on longer than he should have done and ended up a fool and nothing more than a puppet for the "expert" sitting alongside him. I fear John Motson is in danger of doing the same thing. I'm another who hits the red button for the Radio 5 commentary when Motty is commentating.

[Wader]

My all time fave though has to James Alexander Gordon.

 

Can't agree about Martin Tyler. He seems so regional in some way.

[Rhodes]

Originally Posted By: Wader

Brian Moore my favourite. Not because he was good, but because his commentaries just bring so many memories flooding back of that era.

Wader - You're a man after my own heart, do you remember The Big Match and when Paddy Crerand, Derek Dougan, Malcolm Alison and Brian Clough used to be in the studio with Brian Moore who's commentaries were so often memorable although his most remembered is probably the Liverpool v Arsenal game in 1989. I believe a stand is named after him at the Priestfield Stadium which was good of Gillingham to do that as he put them on the map.

[Lato]

"Brian Moore's head looks uncannily like London Planetarium" is or was the name of a Gillingham fanzine. It took its name from a line of the song 'Dickie Davies Eyes' by the magnificent Half Man Half Biscuit.

[Rhodes]

In the good old days there always seemed to be a commentator allocated to a specific area of the Country such as Gerald Sindstad and Kenneth Wolstenholme in the North East, Gerry Harrison in East Anglia, Hugh Johns in the Midlands and Brian Moore in London and the home Counties, that in itself was like you had died and gone to heaven. Someone like Eagles1981 from the modern era could never identify with that and probably hasn't got a clue what we're banging on about.

[Lato]

Sindstadt generally did the North West..wasn't it Roger Tames in the North East?

 

I never liked Brian Moore much and always preferred the regional games on the Big Match especially those commentated on by the 'great one' no not Temile but Hugh Johns.

 

 

[Wader]

I don't why, but I never liked Brian Moore that much at the time, but in recollection do now. It's the voice, the phopars and the things he missed that on reflection made him a commentating pseudo-god. I miss him and his crescendo voice.

 

Cec is right, the regionality of it all was excellent. Pundit to$$ers like Andy Gray and Steve Claridge were doing what they should - playing (one still in his back garden no doubt).

 

The kids of today don't know what they're missing!

[Rhodes]

Wader - That's a great post, how Lato can say that he never liked Brian Moore is beyond me, okay he wasn't everyone's cup of tea in the late 60's and early 70's but mellowed with age culminating in his imortal line 'it's up for grabs now' in 1989 which surely rivals, if not betters, Wolstenholme in 1966.