By Simon Wright – Follow
me on Twitter @Siwri88
The
development of football on TV has evolved tremendously over the past 40
years. Competition for live TV rights
continues to increase, and the personalities that host, report and commentate
on live matches become familiar household figures.
This new
series, The Media Eye will profile some of the most recognised and famous faces
in football in regards to its growth. It
won’t just be TV figures profiled, with radio also getting a look in.
The series
begins looking back at the career of the smooth talking Des Lynam, a favourite
with many and the face of the BBC for 30 years.
The
70-year-old had a broadcasting career spanning more than 40 years. It wasn’t just football that made him a
regular host. He also fronted the
Olympic Games, Sportsnight and Wimbledon for many years on the BBC, before
switching totally to football with a shock switch to ITV in the summer of 1999.
Des was
praised for his witty and strong presentation skills, plus his total sports
portfolio he had. He began his career on
the radio with BBC Radio Brighton in 1968, and it was clear that the Beeb had a
star of the future. A year later, he
joined the national service in London, starting off with commentating on boxing
and even co-presented the long-standing morning programme Today on BBC Radio 4
for two years in the mid-1970s.
Lynam had
done his training behind the microphone, and now it was time to be infront of
the camera. He first presented the
legendary sports show Grandstand on the BBC in 1979, a role he shared with
Steve Rider for the next 12 years as Grandstand went head-to-head with World of
Sport on ITV.
He would have
a persona where the team on Grandstand had fun along the way. In the 1980s, he famously kept talking about
the major sporting events coming up in the summer whilst the highly
professional team behind him were getting involved in an on-screen fight which
was all staged as part of April Fool’s Day.
Des took over
the hosting duties of Match of the Day in 1988, and within a year of the new
role, had one of his most difficult days in broadcasting when he had to front
MOTD on the night of Saturday, 15 April 1989 when 96 Liverpool supporters
perished on the terraces of Hillsborough during a horrible crush on a day where
the FA Cup semi-final between the Reds and Nottingham Forest was meant to take
centre stage. As always the
professional, Lynam kept his emotions in check for the cameras, but off-screen
later admitted it was the most traumatic broadcast of his long career.
He was also
the man to host the Grand National from 1985-1999, including the farce in 1993,
and the IRA bomb scare at Aintree four years later that saw the race abandoned
and rescheduled for 48 hours later. He
also fronted five World Cups for the BBC, five Olympics Games and six years as
one of the main hosts of the weekday sports programme Sportsnight.
In August
1999, the temptation of live UEFA Champions League football and FA Cup action
was too much for Lynam (pictured) who made the switch to ITV after 30 years with the BBC. At the time, he said: “Leaving the BBC after
30 years was not an easy decision to make, but it was time for a new challenge
– and it’s no secret that live football is what I love best.”
Two years
later, the move looked like it might pay off as ITV outbid the BBC to gain
highlights of the Premier League football for £183m. Lynam was the perfect role for The
Premiership, but the move into a primetime Saturday evening slot of 7pm was a
complete disaster. Just 3.1m viewers
watched its second show in the slot, giving the terrestrial broadcaster its worst Saturday night audience in five years.
In November,
the executives bowed to pressure and gave The Premiership the red card,
dismissing it back to a later 10.30pm slot.
In a statement when the move was confirmed, Des said: “I am disappointed
that ITV are moving The Premiership’s start time as I feel confident that it
would have achieved higher audiences in due course. However, I am assured that the move is for
economic and not editorial reasons. I am
proud of the show we’ve created and shall continue to present it at the new
regular time.”
He did do so,
but it was clear all was not well between Lynam and ITV. In 2004, BBC won back the Premier League
contract and Des elected to retire from presenting live sport after hosting
Euro 2004 in Portugal for the broadcaster.
A year later,
he admitted in an interview the move had been a mistake, saying: “It had so
many repercussions and shook me up so much.
If it was a decision I had to make now I probably wouldn’t do it. I went from being a great broadcaster, or at
least a very acceptably good one, to being a somewhat inadequate one
overnight.”
Lynam went on
to present daytime show Countdown for 18 months in 2005 after the sudden death
of the much-loved Richard Whitley, and has presented occasional programmes on
radio, but he quietly faded into the background after his retirement.
However, he
is still known as one of football’s most familiar figures on television, and
left some great memories. One of my
favourites was his opening link to the Euro 96 final, rubbing his hands with
glee when he came on to say: “Good evening from Wembley, it’s the Euro 96
final, England against the Czech Republic!
There I go dreaming again…of course it’s Germany against the Czech
Republic.”
That was Des
Lynam in a nutshell.
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