 With his rapid, passionate, sometimes near-hysterical commentary, BBC
presenter/commentator David Coleman brought excitement to every sporting event
he covered, from the Olympics to football, and possessed one of British
television's most distinctive voices.
Like many other presenters and commentators of his generation, he received a
solid journalistic grounding as a newspaper reporter, rising through regional
papers to become editor of the County Press in Cheshire at just 22. Not content
with print journalism, he moved on to freelance radio work in 1953, before
joining BBC Birmingham as a news assistant in 1954, making his first TV
appearance on Sportsview (1954-68) on the day Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile,
6 May 1954. He quickly rose up the ranks to become sports editor for the
Midlands region in 1955.
His big break came in 1958, when, a few weeks after the start, he replaced
Peter Dimmock as the presenter of the BBC's new Saturday afternoon sports
programme, Grandstand (1958-2007), remaining as regular anchor until 1968. From
1968 to 1973 he fronted Sportsnight (1968-1997) (until 1972 titled Sportsnight
with Coleman). He also presented Sports Review of the Year (1954- ) for many
years from 1961 and, although his last appearance as a presenter was in 1983, he
continued to do interviews and reports. He hosted many other sporting events and
specials, including the Grand National, as well as the sports quiz A Question of
Sport (1979- ) until 1997.
As a commentator he worked on 16 Olympic games, including all the summer
games from Rome 1960 to Sydney 2000, many Commonwealth Games and football World
Cups. One of his finest hours came during the 1972 Munich hostage crisis, when
he was on air for several hours, live and unscripted. He was the BBC's main
football commentator during the 1970s, bringing intensity and soul to countless
games, including most FA Cup finals between 1972 and 1978. From the mid-80s he
mostly limited his commentating to athletics, until his retirement from
broadcasting after the Sydney Olympics 2000.
His boundless energy and vocal dramatics made him a popular subject for
comics. One Spitting Image (ITV, 1984-96) sketch saw his puppet literally
explode with enthusiasm, while the magazine Private Eye celebrated his capacity
for hilarious on-air gaffes by taking his name for its regular column,
'Colemanballs', which preserved for posterity such gems as "If that had gone in,
it would have been a goal" and "It's a race that the Kenyans have dominated -
but, looking at the records, it's the first time they've won it", alongside
similar linguistic manglings from fellow sports commentators and
participants.
But though he was often the butt of comedians' (mostly affectionate) jokes,
his knowledge, commitment and professionalism won him the respect of viewers and
his peers, reflected in the prestigious awards and honours that came his way: an
OBE in 1992, the Royal Television Society's Judges Award for Sport in 1996 and
the Olympic Order in 2000.
Gosta Johansson
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FILM & TV CREDITS
