Insipred by the Nicholas thread: Best and worst commentators.

[Tom Shines]

Best:
Richie Benaud
Bill Lawry
Keery O'Keefe
Mark Nicholas
Geoff Boycott
Ian Healy
Michael Slater
Darren Lehmann
The guy in the van at Channel 4.

Worst:
Ian Chappell
Simon O'Donnell
Tony Greig
Nasser Hussain
Mark Taylor
That new chick on ABC702

 

[brooksy19]

Slats and Kerry on ABC rule.

Kerry cracks me up.

 

[PARRA_FAN]

Best:
Bill Lawry
Richie Benaud
Michael Slater
Mark Nicholas
Kerry O'Keefe
Greg Blewett (not the best, but not bad for a new comer)

Worst:
Mark Taylor
Ian Chappell
Ian Healy
Darren Lehmann

 

[Twizzle]

BEST: Everyone excpet Ian Chappell

WORST: Ian Chappell

 

[El Diablo]

I'll just go worst

Tony Greig
Ian Chappell
Michael Holding
Mark Taylor
Ian Healy
any kiwi

 

[Tom Shines]

I'll just go worst

Tony Greig
Ian Chappell
Michael Holding
Mark Taylor
Ian Healy
any kiwi

Yeah I forgot Michael Holding. He pisses me off aswell.
"Yah mun, the Windies have had 500 bad lbw's against them".

 

[El Diablo]

perpetual whinger who has no idea

should be shot

 

[brooksy19]

The foreign bloke thats been commentating on ABC this summer is Hilarious, he so excitable.

 

[choc_soldier]

Best:
Richie Benaud
Michael Slater
Kerry O'Keefe
Jim Maxwell

Worst:
Ian Healy
Mark Taylor
Ian Chappell

 

[choc_soldier]

The foreign bloke thats been commentating on ABC this summer is Hilarious, he so excitable.

Zolani Bongko. A few people I know think he's quite bad, but there are worse (see above post).

 

[Eddie.]

There are some good commentators around the world. Tony Cozier and Michael Holding, Nasser Hussain, Slats is good, Ian Smith. Kerry is funny but he is also very knowledgable.

Unfortunetly there are many clowns in the commentary box who either put you to sleep with their lifeless acoounts of the game or just seem devoid of any idea of what is going on. Mark Taylor, Bill Lawry, Tony Greig, Waqur Younis to name a few.

 

[sanjane]

Best:
Richie Benaud
Bill Lawry
Keery O'Keefe
Mark Nicholas
Geoff Boycott
Ian Healy
Michael Slater
Darren Lehmann
The guy in the van at Channel 4.

Worst:
Ian Chappell
Simon O'Donnell
Tony Greig
Nasser Hussain
Mark Taylor
That new chick on ABC702

Best (no real order)

Sanjay Manjrekar
Tony Greig
Bill Lawry
Keery O'Keefe
Wasim Akram
Mark Nicholas
Ian Healy
Michael Slater
Simon Hughes
Ian Botham
Mark Richardson
Gavin Larsen
Tim Lane
Michael Holding
Dean Jones
James Brayshaw

Intermediate:

Ranjit Fernando
Ian Smith
Ian Chappell
Ian Healy
Mark Taylor
Jeremy Coney
Waqar Younis
Jim Maxwell

Worst:

Richie Benaud
Geoff Boycott
Greg Chappell
Simon O'Donnell
Nasser Hussain
Shane Warne
Darren Lehmann
John Howard
Jason Gillespie

 

[Balmain_Boy]

Best
Slats
Nasser
Tony Cozier
Fazeer Mohammed
Kerry O'Keefe
Bishop

 

[Moffo]

i would apply a sledgehammer to the following people if given a chance:

- ian healy
- simon o'donnell
- bill lawry
- tony greig - f**king genius
- any of the chappells


i like holding, leave him alone!

 

[ozbash]

chappels should have been drowned before birth.

my all time favourites are dicky bird and the indian bloke who quoted from the witicism book. hillarious.

ian smith is a whinger
mark richardsons ok
nisbo is probably the best we have closely followed by danny morrison.
gav larson should give it all away
coney is a full sized twat
martin crowe is the next size down.

cant wait till the rhuematics gets the better of billys finger and he becomes a commentator.

 

[PB]

Obviously Ian C is a clown.

I remember when they got rid of greg Chappell because he was boring yet kept his as boring brother Ian?! They both should have gone together.

Tony Greig past his used by date about 10 years ago, but unlike others i don't mind Tubby and Heals so much.

I liked the indian fella ABC sometimes get out here, i think his name is Harsha Bogle (spelling would be way off!). He is cool.

 

[Blaze]

Tony Greig is there for overseas viewers. Without him it would just be about how great Australia are. He is effective and I love it when he starts pissing Bill off.

Ian Healy is the worst I have ever heard.

I like pretty much anyone else on channel 9. Taylor, Chappell and Benaud all have superb cricket brains and offer interesting insight.

Bill Lawry is great for capturing the excitment of the moment.

Nicholas is alright when he isn't talking about how he is in love with Warne. I often feel that he is sucking up to the Aussies so that he can keep his job and fit in.

The NZ commentary team is rubbish.

Gavin Larsen is terrible.

Nisbett is a rugby commentator who offers nothing. Most people on this forum would know more about cricket than Nisbo. All he does is read out the speedball readings or tell us how big the crowd is or what the score is. He offers nothing perceptive because he doesn't know enough about the game.

Coney is overrated. Gets a lot of stuff wrong but he is still adequate. Does good pitch reports.

Smith is hated by most aussies which makes me like him more. He is pretty negative but fairly realistic at the same time. He is our only world class commentator IMO. He knows exactly what he is talking about and is frank about it.

Richardson is average. He will become pretty good in time though IMO. He makes too many outlandish predicitions that don't come off because he is still too close to the players and has more faith in them than they deserve.

Slater is the man. Glad that 9 have finally signed him long term.

Martin Crowe was a brilliant commentator when he wasn't trying to create atmosphere with his 'good gracious mavius' 'heavens to betsy' 'holy cow' rubbish. He is very, very intelligent when it comes to reading a cricket match. Probably the best cricket thinker in New Zealand. He also knew loads about our batsmens deficiencies and it was funny when he used to point them out when he was commentating because the NZ team were too proud to accept his help.

The Sky team in England are awful, Channel 4 were all over them in the Ashes. In NZ the first 2 tests were done by Sky and the last 3 by Channel 4 and the difference in quality was unbelievable.

 

[Scott]

Superbly summed up Blaze. Couldn't agree more. Jeremy Coney uses words that are to big for me and loves the sound of his own voice.

 

[Manu Vatuvei]

Every single one of the NZ commentators are awful, without exception. It never ceases to amaze me that former cricketers as fastidious as Mark Richardson and Gavin Larsen could actually be so clueless about the game. What annoys me, generally, is how unobservant they can be. Often when a new batsman or bowler comes to the crease, even a New Zealander that they have been watching day in and day out, they still sum him up using some dated and clearly untrue generalisation. Likewise, often there will be a subtle change in the momentum of a game (i.e. several overs going by with few runs scored) and they seem to be totally oblivious. A great example for me was the first NZ v SL ODI, where Jamie How played out 3 maidens in quick succession, and none of the commentators said one word about it. Then when he brought up his 50 off 85 balls or whatever, they commended him on his dashing strokeplay and made no mention of the fact that he had scored slowly and got bogged down at times.

 

[Up the mighty Phins]

I don't mind the Kiwi bloke (can't remember his name) that joins the ABC team here in Australia whenever NZ are in the country. Nor most of the overseas commentators (Harsha Bogle, Jonathon Agnew, Fazeer Mohammed) that also join the ABC whenever their teams are in Australia. In fact, the ABC team do a great job all round calling the cricket.

Better than some of commentry teams on Fox and on Channel 9.