Yahoo News Two Scots and an American to lead BBC commentary in first Open Championship without Peter Alliss
He was synonymous with the Open Championship as a player and commentator for more than 70 years.
But this week’s 149th staging of golf’s oldest major will be the first without Peter Alliss since he died aged 89 in December.
The "Voice of Golf" – the last of BBC television’s iconic original team of sports commentators – will be succeeded at Royal St George’s by long-time heir Andrew Cotter, who will call the corporation’s highlights coverage alongside Ken Brown and lesser-known Ned Michaels, who also worked alongside Alliss at the last Open two years ago.
Born in Atlanta, Georgia, Michaels spent six years as a member of both the Asian and European Tours, winning three titles including the Philippine Open, but his career was brought to a premature end by a number of serious injuries and he retired from the sport in 2009, prompting a move into broadcasting.
The BBC has decided to stick with the remaining trio for their coverage this year, meaning that no replacement has been drafted in and giving Michaels a more prominent role alongside the two Scots.
The coronavirus crisis denied Alliss the chance to celebrate a 60th year working for the BBC at the tournament after it was cancelled last summer.
But he was given what proved to be one last hurrah in November when the corporation allowed him to commentate on its highlights coverage of the postponed Masters from his Surrey home.
That was the first Masters he had not attended in person for 54 years as well as the first without live terrestrial coverage for 57 years after Sky Sports secured the exclusive rights.
Cotter, who also commentates on the Olympics, Wimbledon, the Six Nations and The Boat Race for the corporation, began working alongside Alliss in 2003.
He led the BBC’s highlights coverage of April’s Masters – its first major golf tournament since Alliss’ death.
Fellow Scot Eilidh Barbour will once again present the BBC’s coverage of the Open, for which it lost the live rights to Sky in 2015 after 60 years. Barbour succeeded Hazel Irvine in 2017.
Former Ryder Cup player Brown has long been the BBC’s lead golf analyst.
The 149th Open begins on Thursday, with the Cotter-led highlights starting at 8pm on BBC Two.
BBC must balance tradition and modernity in post-Alliss world
By Mick Cleary
One by one the voices of sport have laid aside their microphones and shuffled off into the ether, gone but not forgotten, from Dan Maskell, Bill McLaren, Murray Walker and here, at the 149th Open, Peter Alliss, absent in body if not in spirit for the first time in 70 years either as player or commentator.
Their voices reflected their sport, or is it the other way around: Maskell with the delicate tone of a Wimbledon drop shot, McLaren with the burr and the brogue of a Borders bone-crunching derby, Walker all screech and lubricant and Allis, the man on the bar-stool, ‘waffling away,’ drawing you into his world, his story, his perspective, the velvety tone, a purveyor of middle-class tales but with a sharp, man-of-the-people jest or barb that everyone could relate to.
Alliss died last December, aged 89, a good innings as he himself might put it. He wasn’t to everyone’s taste but who is? Only the bland and featureless who upset no-one nor stimulate or enrich either. Alliss certainly did that, seemingly without any stress or bother, unflappable (even if he did miss a couple of key moments in the latter years), with the priceless gift of seeming to be speaking to you and you alone, a personal address that was, in fact, directed at millions.
He was at the mic as he approached his 90th year so this was a natural changing of the guard. There is little point in worrying that the Beeb is embarking on a mission of modernisation as to attract the ever-precious youth market. Golf itself shares those anxieties as well as those objectives, to keep itself relevant and in touch. Fair enough. Sport should aim to be inclusive, diverse and wide-ranging. But it should also be true to its roots.
There is nothing wrong with whimsy and nostalgia. Lord knows, modern reality has been something of a burden of late and if an Alliss anecdote or bon mot can transport us away from the angst of the moment so much the better. A chuckle and a chortle were his staples – from his observation on Miguel Angel Jimenez limbering up here at Sandwich a decade ago ‘He was, you know, the hula hula champion of Santander for many years’ or his wry reflection on yet another wet vista north of the border ‘one of the good things about rain in Scotland in that most of it ends up as Scotch.’
Of course, his core constituency lay in golf clubhouses with Mavis and her sandwiches or Henry with one too many on board. The trick for all broadcasters these days is to work out how to broaden appeal without alienating the faithful. The same is true for newspapers.
The Beeb, of course, is no longer the main player at the Open after losing the live contract to Sky six years ago. But their highlights coverage is still a draw card. Into the Alliss breach steps Andrew Cotter, a name not unfamiliar to viewers and a highly accomplished, polymath broadcaster, able to leaven his commentary with delightful apercus also. As the hundreds of thousands who have followed the adventures of his dogs, Olive and Mabel, mock-narrated by Cotter as if they were willing human participants, can testify, Cotter can manage a touch of the surreal with the best of them.
He will call the coverage alongside Ken Brown and the lesser-known Ned Michaels, who also worked alongside Alliss at the last Open two years ago. Born in Atlanta, Georgia, Michaels spent six years on the Asian and European Tours, winning three titles, but his career was brought to a premature end following a number of serious injuries.
The BBC has decided to stick with that trio for their coverage this year, meaning no replacement will be drafted in and thus giving Michaels a more prominent role as the lone American voice on our screens this week.
Perhaps the era of the king-pin commentator has come to a close. Duties can be shared. The pictures themselves are more pervasive and up-close. Even so, great commentators do add to the images. Alliss did that and he will be missed.
