Guardian obit here.
Great leg spinner, truly great captain, but for my generation known, with Arlott, as one of the two greatest commentators.
Can you imagine an English commentator, even Arlott, criticizing the England team like this:
His final moments of Ashes test commentary:
{ 12 comments }
Chris Bertram 04.10.15 at 12:52 pm
I’ve long held the belief that I read, and enjoyed, a book by Benaud on the the bodyline series. But googling, I can’t seem to find any such book, so it may be a false memory.
Philip 04.10.15 at 2:02 pm
Just saw this posted somewhere else
Richie Benaud’s Eight Rules of Commentary
– Never ask for a statement.
– Remember the value of a pause.
– There are no teams in the world called ‘we’ or ‘they’.
– Avoid cliches and banalities, such as ‘he’s hit that to the boundary’, ‘he won’t want to get out now’, ‘of course’, ‘as you can see on the screen’.
– The Titanic was a tragedy, the Ethiopian drought a disaster, and neither bears any relation to a dropped catch.
– Put your brain into gear before opening your mouth.
– Concentrate fiercely at all times.
– Above all, don’t take yourself too seriously, and have fun.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/11526836/Richie-Benaud-his-eight-rules-of-commentary.html
There is only Jonathan Agnew that I can think from the current British commentators who might criticise the England team like that.
harry b 04.10.15 at 4:38 pm
Thats a great list, captures him perfectly. And fair enough about Aggers — but he certainly uses ‘we’.
Looking at Benaud’s record, and, when he retired, reading a lot about his playing days, he was clearly a quite outstanding player, and a more outstanding captain. Is he remembered well in Australia for that, or is it just too long ago?
chris y 04.10.15 at 6:09 pm
I just about remember him on the ashes tour of 1961. As a 10-year-old I had the impression that he was held in awe as a captain, although he didn’t have a particularly special series with bat or ball, except in the 4th test. He had a strong team, but so did England, and England were outplayed all the way through (except at Headingly, where Trueman took 11 for 88). Retrospectively, I’m sure it was leadership that made the difference.
Tom Slee 04.10.15 at 8:50 pm
Benaud did always seem to be clear that the game is what matters which is a great thing for a commentator. I always liked his low-key commentary on the “ball of the century”: “Gatting has absolutely no idea what has happened” here.
(In his later years, Arlott was a much better commentator before lunch. I remember watching a Sunday league game where wickets fell and boundaries were struck, to complete silence from the commentary box. Wine was almost certainly involved.)
harry b 04.10.15 at 9:32 pm
Arlott was a prodigious drinker from lunchtime onward — I can’t imagine it being tolerated now. On the other hand, he did know how to use silence, which few contemporary commentators have mastered.
Am I right that Benaud and Laker would regularly do the BBC2 Sunday League game together? In my head they were always doing the Sunday League when I was watching. But then, maybe Arlott was just displaying his mastery of silence.
oliver 04.10.15 at 11:25 pm
His commentary on a Botham six during his Headingley 81 innings – “its gone straight into the confectionery stall and out again” – remains the finest line in ports commentary. And he’d have several more in the Top Ten.
Atticus Dogsbody 04.11.15 at 2:26 am
The cream, the bone, the white, the off-white, the ivory or the beige?
84, a good effort, I thought.
Atticus Dogsbody 04.11.15 at 2:29 am
the golden rule we follow around here: we work as a team, and do it *my* way!
JakeB 04.11.15 at 6:38 am
Benaud’s comment on the underarm toss is one of the great moments of sports commentary . . . if we had people like him in American sports instead of wretched pseudo-intellectuals like Bob Costas, perhaps the state of commentary — and the moral qualities of the sports — wouldn’t be so pathetic.
Minnow 04.13.15 at 10:34 am
I am going to miss that voice and clarity of vision so much.
And that Pieterson boy looked good too. What a pity England don’t have anyone like that in the team now.
nick s 04.14.15 at 2:27 am
I liked the obit (Mike Selvey, perhaps?) that said ‘inimitable’ was the wrong word for Richie Benaud, because there was a career to be had from imitating him: Billy Birmingham in Australia, Rory Bremner in his early days in the UK.
Benaud understood that he was punctuating the pictures.
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