From the very beginning of our lives, we all love a good story. As small children, the best bit of bedtime was your parent tucking you in and telling you a story.
As adults, we live for reading the newspaper or a novel or the back of the shampoo bottle while we’re on the toilet. We trawl social media, not just for daft memes and stalking people we are supposedly friends with, but for the stories of the world. They range from children starving in Africa to politicians getting caught with their trousers down; fantasy booking of sporting events to the latest conspiracy about the Royal Family.
But none of those things that we find ever compare to sitting down and listening to someone telling you a story. It might not start with, “once upon a time”, nor should it end with, “and they all live happily ever after”. It might not go the way you thought it would. It might have curveballs or ups and downs, much like life itself.
I love reading a book, the smell of a paperback and the silence around you as your own brain speaks to you the words on the page with the anthology of voices it has at its disposal from hearing people’s accents and nuances over the years. I don’t listen to many audiobooks, to be honest, but I fully understand the attraction of them. My trouble would be that even the most exciting thriller would lull me to my slumber…I think that’s how Freddie Krueger got you wasn’t it?
I could listen to some people’s stories all day. I’m currently reading ‘Rambling Man’ by Billy Connolly and I can hear him saying each word as if he were sat in front of me and speaking to me alone.
There are other voices throughout history that I could listen to, quite happily, for the rest of my life – Richard Briers and Alan Rickman to name a couple.
Sometimes it is more about the story they are telling, how they are telling it, which keeps you hooked in, not just the voice. When I was in high school, one of our English teachers – Mr Smith – spoke with such vigour and flavour about certain books and films. I recall his undiluted passion about ‘10 Rillington Place’, which is a horrid story of a strange man and what he did to his female tenants, but the way in which he described it was masterful in its art of keeping our interest and explaining why it was so wonderfully portrayed on screen and page.
Professional wrestling fans could listen to William Regal tell his stories all day because he conveys them with such a calm passion that it forces you to listen closer and piques your intrigue. Triple H and Edge could tell fabulous stories in their matches in the same way that Mario Balotelli or Joey Barton could make the watching fan love them or hate them with the simplest message on a t-shirt or off-the-ball foul. The Rock could have an audience in the palm of his hand just by picking up a microphone, in much the same way a certain footballer mesmerises thousands of fans just by collecting a ball before they hit a magnificent pass or cross or shot… like Pele or Maradona; Messi or Ronaldo.
What I mean, however, are the actual storytellers. The people who are calling the action; who relay the events which are occurring to the person who is watching on television or listening on the radio. The fans of a golden generation may claim John Motson to be the greatest of all time, and they’d hold a strong argument. He often, still now, echoes around our minds with certain quips he made over the years. Wrestling fans will have their own favourite commentators who they have grown up listening to and each has their own right to that opinion in the same way that people have their own James Bond or Doctor Who.
To tie the two examples together I have brought you, for me the ultimate wrestling commentary team was Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler. They could make the least relevant match seem like a five-star classic, a mediocre or ridiculous segment seem like Shakespearean theatre. They narrated the story as a whole to you and knitted everything together, to the point where if you were at a live event, you would actually miss the commentary and it would sound weird with just the bumps and jumps.
In football, to me at least, that is what the gift of Clive Tyldesley and Ally McCoist gives to me. If I could be sat in the stands, be it at the Maracana for a World Cup final or Ewood Park for an East Lancashire Derby or at my local park watching some school kids just having a knockabout (jumpers for goalposts, isn’t it?) and have Ally and Clive sat behind me calling the action, my football experience would be complete.
Clive Tyldesley, like Good Ol’ JR, has uttered some of the most iconic lines in commentary over the years and we have grown up with his voice in our ears. His, “and Solskjær has won it!” is Jim Ross’, “as God is my witness, he’s broken in half!”. You know he has done his homework, he knows his statistics and figures and you trust that what he says is accurate. The lines he can conjure up illustrate a scene or occasion better than any artist could ever attempt. And they are all with perfect poise and respect or the correct level of sarcasm and humour, whatever the situation may be.
Indulge in some classics:
“He’s showed him the left leg, then the right. Where’s the ball, the defender asks? It’s up his sleeve.”
“Some of Paul Scholes’ tackles come in so late they arrive yesterday.”
“England are learning to walk before they can run with their feet nailed firmly to the ground.”
Sprinkled amongst the delightful slices of quick wit are reams of high art, poetry inspired by emotion – and sometimes, the most skilful efficiency of words. Take Barcelona, on a pulsating night in 1999; Manchester United fans can still repeat his final three minutes of commentary verbatim as they reached the promised land is such dramatic fashion. “Name on the trophy!” is just four words; the full sentence could have been “Will Manchester United’s name be on the trophy?” after Teddy Sheringham’s equaliser. A delicious pause, then four clearly enunciated words was all he needed to create a more vibrant picture.
His speech at the conclusion of arguably the most entertaining match at Euro 2024 – the shock result of Georgia 2-0 Portugal – was heartfelt and respectful:
“…this is the greatest night in the history of Georgian international football. They’ve come to their first major tournament finals; they have beaten Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal and they have qualified for the knockout rounds. And the European championship finals are better for having them. They play with conviction, the play with spirit, unbelievable energy, no little skill. They are backed by passionate fans who know just what this means to the identity of their nation and they will celebrate long into this famous night because Georgia have beaten Portugal by two goals to nil.”
Ally McCoist, like “The King”, has been there and done it. He stood on that field and put the ball in the net and he brings both experience and legitimacy to his views, as well as humour. His reaction, when preparing to begin a stint of commentary live in a stadium, to the opening bars of an AC/DC song is timeless and will be replayed for a long time.
Some of his brilliant quotes:
“The world is covered by 70% water and 30% by N’Golo Kante.”
“Hummels looks like he’s just turned up for the dad’s race on sports day“ when trying to outpace Kylian Mbappe.
After listening to a passionate Graeme Souness in the studio talking about Scotland v England, “I was just about ready to invade Carlisle there!”
Give me one or the other on the microphone for a game and I’m happy and content with my lot. Give me both and I need nothing else from the match. Individually and collectively, they are, in my humble opinion, unbeatable. On their own, they cannot be matched and together they make a magnificent and complementary team. I think the greatest adulation I can give them is that I would rather listen to a 0-0 draw told by Ally & Clive than a 10-goal thriller let down by poorer orators.
If I have explained this half as well as either of these two legends could, I would be both absolutely astounded and profoundly pleased with myself.
Long may they reign as the kings of commentary. Ally & Clive, great orators of football.
Heart of Football 
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