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| - Barry George Davies MBE (born 24 October 1940 in London, England) is a British sports commentator. Although best-known for his football commentary, Davies has also put his talents to numerous sports including beach volleyball, ice skating, tennis, gymnastics, hockey and athletics, primarily in the BBC's Olympics coverage. He was also the 'Voice of the Boat Race' for years between 1993 and 2004, when the BBC lost the coverage of the event to ITV, and the presenter of Maestro in the 1980s, a series interviewing retired sporting legends. Davies was educated at Cranbrook School - which also numbers commentators Brian Moore and Peter West amongst its alumni - and King's College London, where he read Dentistry. He started his broadcasting career with British Forces Broadcasting whilst serving in the army in West Germany. He joined BBC Radio in 1963, working concurrently as a sports journalist for The Times. Ahead of the 1966 World Cup he made his first steps into television with ITV. He made his debut on a Fairs Cup tie between Chelsea and A.C. Milan, before covering England's pre-World Cup friendly with West Germany. During the World Cup in England, Davies covered all the matches in the North East. His spell with ITV continued for another three years, providing commentaries for ABC and Granada Television. Davies also covered the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, commentating on a number of sports. When LWT launched in 1968, he was the choice of the Deputy Head of Sport John Bromley to commentate on and present their new football show The Big Match. Bromley's boss Jimmy Hill won the argument though and installed his choice, Brian Moore, in the role - a role he would fill for another thirty years. Most of Davies's career has been spent in the opposite camp, with the BBC. For 35 years he was synonymous with the Match of the Day programme. He made his debut in unusual circumstances on 9 August 1969. The programme was to take up a new format, providing each region with its own second match. Davies was signed primarily to cover matches in the North of England and was assigned League Champions Leeds United's match with Tottenham Hotspur on day one. However on the day before the broadcast, main commentator and presenter David Coleman lost his voice. Davies stepped in and commentated on the main match, Crystal Palace v Manchester United, and co-presented the show. His final appearance on the programme came on 25 September 2004 . Davies's reason for retiring from football commentary was that he felt he was not getting enough "big" matches, and was being "downgraded".As a BBC football commentator Davies covered nine World Cups - including the 1994 final - and seven European Championships. He commentated on the final of the 1972 tournament in Belgium. He was usually overlooked for the big finals, covering only two FA Cup Finals in his career - 1995 and 1996, as John Motson regularly landed the key games. But the European Cup final was usually his when the BBC covered it : he commentated on twelve in all - including triumphs for Liverpool and Nottingham Forest, and the horrors of Heysel in 1985. He also tended to commentate on the draws for the World Cup and European Championship and on the Football League Cup final on the rare occasions it was shown on the BBC. Despite usually missing out on commentating on the final itself, Davies would normally be chosen for at least one England match in a major finals if they qualified. Famous England matches he commentated on include the quarter-finals against Argentina in World Cup 1986 and Cameroon in World Cup 1990 and the semi-final of Euro 96 against Germany. He was also often the BBC's choice of commentator if Scotland were involved in a World Cup match, such as the opening game of World Cup 1998 against Brazil. Although Motson and Davies were often portrayed as firm rivals, the pair said in a documentary on the history of commentary in January 2007 on Radio 4 that they had always had a good relationship and had regularly written congratulatory letters to each other when the other had been chosen for leading matches. Davies devotes a chapter, Motty and Me, in his autobiography, Interesting, Very Interesting to his disappointment at continually missing out on the big matches to Motson but insists there is "no animosity" between the pair.He continues to work for the BBC on a freelance basis, covering the Winter Olympics and Commonwealth Games and in the summers of 2007 and 2008 could be heard commentating on the French Open and the Wimbledon Championships. He has also appeared as a guest panellist on the long-running BBC game show, Call My Bluff.On 23 August 2007, Headline press published his memoirs of 40 years in sports broadcasting, entitled 'Interesting, Very Interesting' after a commentary line from a match between Derby and Manchester City in the 1970s. On 28 August 2007, he revealed on Hawksbee & Jacobs that he was a fan of Tottenham Hotspur. Davies said he did not want to be accused of bias, so did not want to reveal who he supported during his career, or even where he was born. With it now being the norm for commentators to reveal their favourite sides, Davies was possibly the last television football commentator to keep his loyalties to himself during his career; he revealed on a radio interview with Simon Mayo in 2007 (after he had retired from football commentary) that he supports non-league side Windsor & Eton. Barry Davies commentated on the Hockey and beach volleyball at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. (en)
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| rdfs:comment
| - Barry George Davies MBE (born 24 October 1940 in London, England) is a British sports commentator. Although best-known for his football commentary, Davies has also put his talents to numerous sports including beach volleyball, ice skating, tennis, gymnastics, hockey and athletics, primarily in the BBC's Olympics coverage. (en)
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