http://www1.skysports.com/f1/news/2...how-be-in-the-audience-and-send-in-your-views I know they will be desperate for content for a while, but ffs! Hopefully a one off before he is replaced
And rightly so. Wonder if it's possible to hijack it and see if a ridiculous question or 2 can get asked on air, Horner there too? do we get Bernies double points if we can trip up both the balloons live on air?
FFS, why can't they have a journalist special show or something. Instead we have to watch this dumb clown try and host his own comedy show. Well I'm certainly not.
It's even worse than that, ignoring the fact he thinks he is funny (and isn't), he's "graduated" to getting his own show where he is taking questions like some all powerful god of knowledge when he doesn't even know his arse from his elbow... though he'd have a go at guessing and invariably get that wrong 90% of the time too.
People really should write in to Sky and explain how painful Formula 1 is with this clown. The commentary just obliterates races, even those rare few that are good battles.
No...wait a minute, apologies, it's a grey car.... Is that HAMILTON, DOES HE HAVE A PROBLEM? "I think that's a Sauber Crofty" Apologies..
Alonso overtakes 2 cars for position: No commentary. Mercedes laps a Lotus: "And that's the Mercedes, with a smooth move on the Lotus. Right down to a few cm!" Now Anthony tell us that time you bought a loaf of bread from a shop in Grimsby.
Even when he does commentate seriously on any wheel to wheel action, his voice is horribly squeaky. Then we get a cringe worthy quote afterwards like "good boy" as if he's at a dog track.
That's not necessarily exclusive to him, though. Edwards got so excited at the start of the last race he had a hilarious voice crack
I have to agree about Croft. I'll refrain from adding the cringeworthy 'y' which he seemed to adopt (and certainly promoted) himself, as if trying to convince his imagined devotees that someone before them liked him so much he was dubbed with a matey nickname. Let's go back in time, Croft, to what must be 'your' era. You are a walking, talking, self-promoted, argumentative for the sake of trying to have a personality, cliché. (And no, Croft; that is not a compliment). You come across as an out-moded half-wit 70s DJ who would have had me cringing at the time; the type who gets too much air-time, likes the sound of his own voice, and attempts to bestow upon himself some utterly misplaced 'star quality'. The only such claim he may have is that he is marginally better that the UK's biggest ever error in sports commentary: Legard. (And no, Croft; that's not a compliment either).
Can anybody think of any living person who had a matey nickname like "Crofty" who wasn't a complete and utter cock? Nope, me neither.
Plus they both use that annoying line of "it's lights out and away we go". I'm not a fan of Edwards either really but at least he talks with some decent amount of knowledge.
Is it just the fact that we're all trying to compare current commentators to the same level as Murray Walker & James Hunt, that we think the current crop, and to be honest anyone other than the original pairing (Poss exception of Brundle) just don't cut the mustard? Allen, Legard and Croft (no 'y') have all been panned for their style, yet has there actually been anyone since the days of Hunt and Walker that we can all say were well liked? The daft thing is that Hunt & Walker didn't actually get on well with each other for a long long time! Walker was the ultimate professional with all his meticulous preparation, Hunt would usually turn up half-cut with a bottle of wine about 5 mins before the race would start! It was a partnership that worked and we have to accept it is highly unlikely we will ever be privilidged to listen to a pairing that were so ill-matched, yet worked so well.
Actually, I think that in general, Ben Edwards is very, very good. I reckon he's the best 'pure'* commentator (although perhaps importantly, he's no slouch on the track) since dear old Murray** commanded the ship. I confess that my listening experience for F1 broadcasts is both limited and very often after the event – and therefore that my opinion may be less valid than many – but the important thing is that he compliments rather than intrudes upon events. To my mind, Legard was by far the most intrusive and the least well-informed, as well as the rudest ignoramous imaginable to long-suffering co-commentator and audience alike. Re-running the event, he was enough to have me reaching for the mute button (yes, quite literally). Unlike BBC's dreadful error called Legard, James Allen is pretty well-informed but he can also be pretty infuriating; especially when one accidentally keys into his hopeful and repetitious use of the word "interesting". He seems to use it as a means of convincing listeners that what he is about to say is somehow more valid than his previous "interesting" statement. But in my opinion, Croft's combination of conceit and ignorance (in that order) puts him far closer to Legard's level of intrusion than Allen's. *Pure as opposed to those not primarily trained as journalists. **Murray Walker was also criticised in his early days. However, unlike Legard and Croft, he has natural redeeming qualities. (Legard had none whatsoever and Croft is demonstrating that he is too comfortably up his own backside to see daylight). Perhaps Murray's greatest asset always was, and always will be, that he is so essentially likeable that people naturally forgive/forgave his highly entertaining errors: somehow one always forgave him; and of course, even James Hunt grew to like our favourite mint enormously…
Whoever said he was like a 70's dj is absolutely spot on Listen to David Croft's commentary then go and listen (i assume you'll find old top of the pops videos online) to Tony Blackburn talk. It's almost an identical. Constant "mateyness", rubbish attempts at humor, a total lack of true understanding of what he is talking about and the overall feeling that he is trying so hard to be "entertaining" and the center of attention. Alan Partridge would be an upgrade. Always feel sorry for those working in the box with him, who generally are all pretty decent and try to make the best out of a bad situation (him). You can actually hear some of them getting irritated with him these days, in particular Anthony Davidson and Ted Kravitz during free practice sessions, and occasionally hear a bit of friction with Brundle (Very much like his last 4 or 5 races commentating with Legard, where he had given up and was more sniping at his errors than co-commentating)
