Richie was so good, even his silence said it all
RICHIE BENAUD made commentary look easy. Believe me, it isn’t. But he put in the hard work and he rose to the top. There’s a lesson there for a few of the blokes who pick up a mic today.
I had the great honour of doing a stint on Channel 9 in Australia during an Ashes Test a few years ago. They’d only recently introduced the concept of using three commentators in one go and, as usual, Richie was keeping his contributions to a minimum. I mean that in a good way — again, another lesson for today’s batch.
Anyway, Richie had noticed something out in the middle and flicked what we call the lazy switch, so he could have a quiet word with the producer without the viewers hearing him. He wanted some footage of an incident he’d spotted a couple of overs earlier — Shane Warne had done something in the slips and it had passed the rest of us by.
Finally, the producer located what he wanted. Warne, who hadn’t bowled yet — but who would go on to skittle England for the umpteenth time — had picked up his bowling marker, a small white disc, and thrown it to where he thought he’d be starting his run-up.
Between overs, they broadcast Warne’s gesture. Richie said: ‘Shane Warne’s just put a marker down.’
That was his only contribution in the half-hour we were on together, but it beat anything else we had to offer. One line! It was classic Richie: he had the eagle eye to see what Warne was doing in the first place, the confidence to stay quiet while we rabbited on, and the perfect choice of words. As he might have put it himself: marvellous.
I thought of Richie during the World Cup final last month. For some reason Star Sports, the tournament’s global broadcasters, used a team of rookies to commentate on the match.
Some of them were among the game’s greatest modern-day players, but it was painfully apparent none of them had done much commentary. It was terrible TV. They just couldn’t pinpoint the moment — no emotion, no elation, no despair. How we missed Richie that evening. He never went overboard but he could have captured all those qualities in that understated way of his. Sometimes he could be very understated indeed.
I remember talking to Michael Slater, who teamed up with him in the commentary box in his later years. He spoke about one day when Richie did two half-hour stints as one of three commentators, and did not say a single word.
Slats described it as s ‘ bagging a pair’, thee term for a batsman who o gets two ducks.
But that was Richie. If f there was nothing to add d to the picture the view- ers could see, he wouldn’tt add to it. It really painss me now, for example, when hen commentators start reading out a graphic that has appeared on screen for all to see. It might be the top 10 leading runscorers at a particular ground, or something similar, and they just read out the list! It’s incredibly lazy.
Richie would consider the list, and then say something like: ‘And No 4 could soon be moving to No 2.’ He wouldn’t even name names — he respected the intelligence of the viewer. And I know how much viewers responded to that.
One of his best qualities was that he never sought the limelight. He wasn’t in it for the ego. He’d turn up in the commentary box and if he was off-air, he’d set up at the back of the box, take out his computer and do his homework on the newest player on the scene, or look up the latest horseracing odds.
The chemistry he had with the likes of Tony Greig and Bill Lawry was amazing. It was unmissable. And it was based on a deep mutual respect and love of the game.
And, boy, he loved the game. One evening, Richie, Ron Atkinson and I were treated to dinner in Birmingham by the News of the World, who we were all working for at the time. Ron was covered in bling and telling us all how he could get into any nightclub in town and was ready for a lively evening.
Richie wasn’t a big drinker, but he’d allowed himself a couple of glasses of red, and he started telling this story about the great Australian leg- spinner Bill O’Reilly.
It’s fair to say the story was on the longish side and by the time Ron had disappeared into the night and Richie was being bundled into a waiting taxi, we were still learning all about Bill O’Reilly…
He had this wit that made all other commentators want to be like him. He didn’t really go in for after-dinner speaking, but he might occasionally be asked to say a few words.
Once he spotted me in the audience, and quickly remembered the time I was hit in the groin by Jeff Thomson ( have I mentioned that before?).
‘Ah, there’s David Lloyd,’ Richie said. ‘I remember him telling me in 1974-75 how he could play Thommo with his c***… and then he proceeded to do precisely that.’ The joke was all in the pause and the timing.
He was a great leg- spinner, a superb captain, and a lovely bloke. I can just imagine how warmly he’ll be welcomed by some of the other great commentators up in the sky: Brian Johnston, Alan McGilvray, John Arlott, even Freddie Trueman.
Fred was often known to splutter: ‘I just don’t know what’s going off out there.’
Richie, it’s safe to say, never suffered from the same affliction. We’ll miss him dearly. And so will cricket.