Latest news with #commentary
The Sun
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Sun
What did Nick Kyrgios say after being axed from BBC's Wimbledon coverage?
Outspoken Australian tennis star Nick Kyrgios has publicly criticised the BBC's "very strange" decision to drop him from its coverage Wimbledon 2025. His reaction was characteristically candid and laced with snarky comments about the broadcaster's decision and his potential replacement. 3 3 Tennis bad boy Nick Kyrgios had been hoping to play at the All England Club for the first time since losing the 2022 final to Novak Djokovic. However, The 30-year-old confirmed he would not be appearing because of a recurring injury. What did Nick Kyrgios say? He said on Instagram: "Just wanted to give everyone a quick update — l've hit a small setback in my recovery and unfortunately won't make it back for grass season this year. "I know how much you've all been looking forward to seeing me out there, and I'm genuinely sorry to disappoint. "This is just a bump in the road though, and I'm already working hard to get back stronger than ever. 'Thank you for all your continued support — it means everything to me. See you soon!" And on June 10, 2025, reports emerged that he won't even be there as a commentator — which he has now confirmed. Confidence in his own credentials Guardian: 'I know I'm a great commentator. All I've done for 20 years is play, study and breathe this sport. 'I also think tennis needs commentators who say things that not everyone says'. He argued that his extensive experience on the professional circuit, including victories over some of the sport's greatest players, sets him apart from other pundits. Nick Kyrgios breaks silence on split with ex-girlfriend Costeen Hatzi as Wimbledon finalist reveals new look Criticism of the BBC and his replacement Nick didn't shy away from questioning the BBC's decision, describing his exclusion as 'unfortunate' and insisting: 'it's probably their loss more than mine'. Referencing his apparent replacement on the commentary team, Nick said: 'I understand they've got Chris Eubanks, but he hasn't beaten the greatest of all time multiple times. 'When someone's beaten Federer, Nadal, Murray and Djokovic and has incredible insights, it's very strange you wouldn't want that person adding knowledge to tennis fans'. Eubanks' best run at Wimbledon came in 2023, when he stunned the likes of Cameron Norrie and Stefanos Tsitsipas before losing in five sets to Daniil Medvedev in the quarter-finals. I know I'm a great commentator. All I've done for 20 years is play, study and breathe this sport Nick KyrgiosThe Guardian But Nick hasn't shut the door on working for the BBC again at some point in the future, explaining: "I'm sure our paths will cross again. "I only ever want to add humour, some knowledge and some great atmosphere." Nick on Wimbledon Despite his disappointment, Nick expressed his enduring affection for Wimbledon, recalling his breakthrough on the Grand Slam stage at the event in 2014 and describing it as 'the pinnacle of tennis'. He also acknowledged feeling somewhat out of place at the tournament, saying: 'I definitely feel like a snowman in the desert there, but I enjoy it'. Although Nick has now pulled out of this year's Roland Garros and Wimbledon, he is determined to resume playing this year. He added: "Yes, for sure. I'm definitely playing the US swing and I'll take it one day at a time." 3 Nick's hiring by the BBC in 2024 was met with criticism by senior MPs and women's campaigners. Women and equalities committee chair Caroline Nokes said the broadcaster should "hang its head in shame". A BBC statement at the time said: "We are in no way condoning his cited previous actions or behaviours, on and off the court, and he is employed to share his views on tennis only. "He has provided similar services to other major sports broadcasters in recent months. "The legal process he was involved in has concluded, is well documented, and he has spoken about it publicly." In February 2023, Nick admitted to assaulting ex-girlfriend Chiara Passari. But a magistrate in Canberra, Australia, said the 2021 incident was 'a single act of stupidity or frustration' — sparing the sports star from receiving a criminal record. The BBC is yet to issue an official public explanation for its decision.
Telegraph
5 days ago
- Sport
- Telegraph
BBC Wimbledon's Andrew Castle: ‘You have to know when to shut up!'
In 1990, at the European Indoor Championships in Berlin, Andrew Castle stumbled elegantly into a new career. Having been knocked out of the doubles in the quarter-finals by Goran Ivanišević and Petr Korda, Castle was invited by the BSkyB commentator Gerald Williams to be an analyst on a match between Luiz Mattar and Jean-Philippe Fleurian. He loved every minute of it. For two years, Castle moonlighted as a Sky commentator in between tournaments, before being offered a full-time position in 1992. The former British No 1 and Australian Open mixed-doubles finalist, then aged 28, did not hesitate to retire from playing: 'Do you want to travel halfway around the world to lose your second match against somebody that you should beat, and not get paid very much? Or would you like to talk about it, get paid, and then go home and sleep in your own bed?' More than three decades on, Castle is now one of the voices of the British summer, having commentated on the Wimbledon Championships for the BBC since 2002. When we speak, he is at home in Cobham, Surrey, preparing himself for another full day at the Queen's Club tournament, surrounded by notes, boning up on Carlos Alcaraz's quarter-final opponent, Arthur Rinderknech [Alcaraz went on to win the title last Sunday]. It's all good prep for the hectic Wimbledon fortnight. After so many years at SW19, Castle has his rhythm. 'I go in on the motorbike – public transport from here is just brutal – I park in the same place. I put my head down and get on with it. It's a place of work for me. I'll come home on the motorbike, eat, and it'll be time for bed. And then repeat.' The commentators, it seems, have to be as disciplined as the players. 'Not a single blowout,' confirms Castle. 'There's plenty of time the rest of the year for that.' When Sue Barker left Sky for the BBC in 1993, Castle – tall, handsome, smooth – was promoted to presenting across various sports, from golf to Nascar. It was a role that he took to slightly less naturally than jumping into the commentary box. 'I'd have running-order dreams,' he says. 'The hours, the days I spent preparing for my first time on air. I was so uptight, so nervous and, no doubt, extremely sweaty.' By 2000, he had mastered the art form and left Sky to become co-host of the ITV breakfast show, GMTV, where he remained until 2010, interviewing everyone from Vera Lynn and Tom Cruise to Tony Blair and Benjamin Netanyahu, while also enjoying a memorable appearance on Strictly Come Dancing – where he lost in a dance-off to M People's Heather Small (his samba lacked bounce) – and hosting a couple of short-lived game shows. Following that, in 2013, came a 10-year stint on the talk-radio channel LBC. Throughout it all, however, has been tennis. Despite having no intention of going back to the sport after he left Sky, Castle could not resist the lure of the BBC and Wimbledon. Soon, he was fronting the men's final, as Roger Federer beat Mark Philippoussis in 2003 to win the first of his 20 major titles. 'It was only my second Wimbledon and they told me on the Friday I'd be doing the final [on the Sunday],' he says. 'I'm sure plenty of people thought it was too early. I remember very distinctly the executive producer, Dave Gordon, came up to me by the tea urns – where we had polystyrene cups, those were the days – and he said, 'I just want you to know, I didn't want you for this job.' I said, 'Oh, thanks, Dave, any other words of encouragement?' He said, 'Just remember. This isn't a tennis match. It's an event.' And he was right about that.' Now it is Castle who dispenses the wisdom, having racked up 21 Wimbledon men's singles finals, sharing the booth with John McEnroe, Tim Henman, Jimmy Connors, Boris Becker and more. The key to good sports commentary, says Castle, is simple: 'Know your audience. Know the rules. And know when to shut up!' Knowing how to handle your co-commentators is a skill that Castle has learnt, too, though last year's Wimbledon threw up a new challenge in the shape of tennis's enfant terrible, Nick Kyrgios. The previous year, the Australian had called Castle a 'clown' on X and he didn't hold back in 2024, either, dubbing his new colleague 'disrespectful' and stating he 'probably never played tennis at a high level'. How does Castle assess these spats between him and Kyrgios now? 'Me and him? It wasn't me and him. It was him,' he says firmly. 'I didn't say or do anything, sorry. Look, he tweeted something and my life wasn't very easy for a while. And he said, 'Sorry, mate.' And that was it. We don't have an issue.' Castle describes Kyrgios's talents as a commentator as 'absolutely superb' and would welcome the chance to work with him again – although the BBC has opted not to employ Kyrgios this summer. Castle does have an issue, however, with social media, and left it in 2021 on the advice of his family. 'It's a bear pit,' he says. 'I certainly wouldn't go anywhere near Twitter again. It's incredible how the discourse has become so base. It's a dangerous time.' Having hosted phone-ins on the often pugilistic LBC for many years, he is familiar with bear pits. During his time on air, he got into heated tussles with trans-rights advocates, net-zero campaigners and pro-Palestine activists. He also received death threats, which he describes as 'par for the course'. There was much speculation in 2023 when Castle was no longer on air at LBC. It was, he says, his decision. 'The final straw for me was the October 7 attacks. We were on air when it was unfolding. That, plus the invasion of Ukraine – I just got to the point where I thought I wanted to step away. Not just from social media, but from consuming and broadcasting these traumatic events.' While Castle was stepping away from social media, a certain other BBC sports presenter was using it more and more. How does Castle reflect on the demise of Gary Lineker's BBC career? 'I've known Gary a long time,' he says. 'I was amazed that he suddenly became so outspoken on various issues and it made things very difficult, clearly, for a lot of people at the BBC. But it's a changing landscape – what's acceptable and what's not. I've got to be honest, I was more than a little surprised, as a news journalist, when I saw him making comparisons between the language used in the British government's immigration policy and Germany in the 1930s. This is very, very provocative stuff and it has to be dealt with. Listen, we have freedom of speech in this country and Gary is allowed to have his say. And he still has a very successful broadcasting career, so he hasn't lost much.' For Castle's part, he's delighted to be 'sticking to tennis', being able to dedicate himself to the sport he loves without becoming embroiled in the heat of political debate. As for Wimbledon, he can't look beyond Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner for the men's singles title, but highlights Britain's Jack Draper as one who could muscle in. |He would also love to see a run from Emma Raducanu: 'She's a little bit special, she's capable of great things.' After the grass-court season, it will be time to unwind and have some 'blowouts', one of which will be the wedding of his daughter Georgina, a musical-theatre star who is in Mean Girls in the West End. 'Where did her voice come from? I have absolutely no idea. I told her when she was 15, under no circumstances should she pursue this career. There you go – never listen to your parents.' The wedding, Castle admits, will be 'quite stagey'. Perhaps the father of the bride will brush up on that samba. 'It was a moment of electricity': Andrew Castle's best Wimbledon moments 1975: The first trip The first time I was at Wimbledon, 1975, the Arthur Ashe year. I remember walking onto Centre Court and up the steps with my mum, and I just thought, 'Oh my god, this is the place to play'. I saw Ashe, Niki Pilić, Chris O'Neil, Chris Evert… I went over to No 2 Court just to watch Ilie Năstase. There was a glamour and an otherworldliness to the stars of sport in those days, an air of mystery, before every tournament was covered by cameras. So to witness up-close, as an 11-year-old, the brooding nature of Năstase. To see his three-stripe Adidas and his big quad muscles, watching him swear and then hitting some shot that I could only dream of hitting. These were the days when the love started for the sport. 1986: Stepping onto court My first match was against the Australian Brod Dyke, and I could see my mum on the other side of Court 6. I was wearing white Pumas. I remember looking down and seeing the stripe against the green of the grass. That was a moment of electricity. Swiftly followed by when Brod hit a return of serve into the net, and I had won a match at Wimbledon! At the press conference, [the tennis correspondent] Neil Harman said to me, 'You do know who you play next, don't you?' Six months prior to that, I'd been living in a low-rent place in Wichita, Kansas, wondering what I was going to do with my life. I was going to try and be a tennis player, but I had no real clue. And six months on, I was at Wimbledon about to play [the French Open champion] Mats Wilander. 1986: Getting a pep talk from a great The Centre Court anteroom is quite a bare place, nothing much more than a couple of benches. The royal box is above. You just sit there and wait. It's like you're about to be executed. And then, in walked Chris Evert. I mean, it's me – and Chris Evert [who had just won her 18th major at the French Open]. She just leant over and said, 'You'll be fine once the knock-up starts.' And I thought, 'Thanks, Chrissy'. I've never spoken to her about it, but it was a great moment for me. I should thank her for such kindness to a nervous 22-year-old. 2005: Sharing a commentary box with the bad boys of tennis I once commentated with both Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe. They weren't supposed to get on and it was deemed to be some sort of titanic battle between these Tyrannosaurus rexes. But they greeted each other with warmth and something approaching love for everything we've been through together. We had the most wonderful afternoon, most of it spent with the microphones off, chatting – or, more accurately, me listening to them. To sit in the box with Connors and McEnroe? You've got to be kidding. 2013: Andy ends 77 years of hurt The 2013 final. Andy Murray versus Novak Djokovic. Murray went 40-love up and then Djokovic made a fight of it. We couldn't believe it – 10 or 11 minutes later, they were still going. The camera guys did a great job – I remember there was this gentle push in, to Novak's eyes and to Andy's eyes, and I wrestled briefly with myself whether I should say what I was about to say: 'Sporting immortality doesn't come easy.' I've watched Murray since he was a child and here he was about to achieve this wonderful thing. I was pleased to find a line that summed it up. I also remember, right after Novak hit the winning point, Tim Henman jumped to his feet and hit me in the head with his elbow. So the memorable line for this historic moment could well have been very different... Wimbledon begins on the BBC on Monday; follow the Women's Summer of Sport across BBC Sport
Wall Street Journal
23-06-2025
- General
- Wall Street Journal
I Envy the Nightly Newsless
Years ago I wrote a little book on the large subject of envy. It was part of a series on the seven deadly sins. What I discovered is that apart from the standard resentment-laden envy, there is what I termed 'emulative' envy. Under the spell of emulative envy, you don't wish to attack or strip the possessions or qualities of other people but instead to imitate, match or surpass them. I envy people who restrain themselves from watching news on television, something I am apparently unable to do. Every so often I mention to a friend some event or incident I saw on the television news. The response will often be a version of, 'Oh, I stopped watching a decade ago.' Others respond: 'I restrict myself to 15 minutes a day. No more.' When I query them about this, the answers are generally short and not sweet: 'I find television news depressing.' Or: 'I really don't get that much out of it.' Or: 'It's all so hopelessly politicized.' All true. Television news has the advantage over print media of being able to show things 'live.' Print describes a riot while television shows it. Today, given all the security cameras hanging about, TV can often show robberies, even murders, as they are happening. Yet there is something missing from television news—intelligent commentary on what is being shown. Television news is too ubiquitous to be useful. Most channels broadcast local news four times a day—morning, noon, evening and late-night. On cable, the news is on all day long. Sports and weather each get five minutes, whether they need it or not. They usually don't, so viewers learn about drizzle in Montana and a nice catch in a minor-league baseball game in Alabama. Repetition of previous news gets even more time.
Daily Mail
21-06-2025
- Sport
- Daily Mail
Commentator Chip Caray's shocking slip of the tongue during Pride night commercial goes viral
A baseball commentator suffered an unfortunate slip of the tongue at the worst possible time on Saturday. St. Louis Cardinals announcer Chip Caray was asked to read a Disability Pride promo during the fourth inning of their game against the Cincinnati Reds. But he accidentally mispronounced 'flag', turning the word into an unintentional homophobic slur. 'Disability Pride Night is July 10 and with a themed ticket fans take home a Cardinals cap featuring the Disability Pride f**', Caray said before correcting himself to say 'flag'. There was then a painful silence that lasted around 30 seconds after the mistake as the game continued in the background. Caray's colleague Brad Thompson finally broke the silence by commenting on a pitch that was called for a ball. Fans quickly flocked to social media to comment on the humiliating error and share their thoughts. One posted: 'Uh oh, thats a rough one lol'. Another commented: 'Loudest silence I've ever heard lol'. A third added: 'It was an obvious slip of the tongue just a simple apology and move on.' 'The silence after is the apology he's obviously mortified and probably has a thousand thoughts running in his head,' another viewer said. 'He should not be reprimanded. It was literally a slip of the tongue. I highly doubt Caray is running around using that word. People need to focus on real outrage.'
The Independent
16-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Mark Nicholas' proudest memory tinged by sadness as 2005 Ashes marked end of era
Mark Nicholas has bittersweet memories of his role fronting Channel 4's coverage of the 2005 Ashes, his pride in the enduring 'mythology' of the series tinged by sadness at the end of the free-to-air era. Nicholas was the broadcasting anchor charged with carrying a rapt nation through many of the key moments of a contest that remains seared into the memories of cricket fans. Heading up an elite commentary cast featuring the likes of the late Richie Benaud and Tony Greig, as well as Sir Geoffrey Boycott, Michael Atherton and Michael Slater, Nicholas' debonair style crystallised many of the most thrilling moments as England regained the urn for the first time in 18 years. One passage in particular lives on, Steve Harmison's vital dismissal of Michael Clarke at Edgbaston and the subsequent call of: 'One of the great balls! Given the moment, given the batsman, given the match…that is a staggering gamble!' Speaking to the PA news agency two decades later, the current MCC chair reflects: 'You hear a lot of soundbites from that series, even 20 years on. Some of what I said didn't always make much sense, but I think the best commentary is reactive. When you plan to say certain things it doesn't work as well. ' David Bowie once gave an interview about 'Life on Mars' and said, 'It's a good song but I've no idea what I was writing about'. I sort of know what he means, you can be creatively successful completely unintentionally. 'I cannot tell you how often I get stopped, people telling me with all their hearts that 2005 and our coverage of it was what got them into cricket. 'Of course, it was the fact that England beat Australia after so long and that it was so thrilling. But to hear people, even England cricketers, say you helped get them into the game…you can't be more flattered than that. 'Some of us brought hyperbole, some did the deep analysis, Richie was minimalism brilliantly applied. I remain more proud of that time than anything else in my career, there was a certain element of mythology for all of us that summer, players and commentators alike.' Yet 2005 was not just the high water mark for Nicholas' BAFTA-winning team, it was also the end of the road. Sky television took over exclusive broadcast rights of English cricket in the aftermath, with home Tests having lost their 'Crown Jewel' status as a category A listed event. It remains a source of regret to Nicholas that the surge of public interest, which saw 7.4 million viewers tune in to the Oval finale, instantly encountered a paywall. 'I do feel desperately sad that an opportunity was blown. It will never leave me,' he says. 'They had to make sure Test match cricket stayed (free to air), even if it was in a joint broadcast, and if that meant a bit less money then so be it. 'I'm not anti-Sky at all, I'm glued to their coverage three or four nights a week. But it was a bad misjudgement. Cricket was a very powerful thing at that moment and it was the time to make sure that continued. 'I was asked to co-host the celebration at Trafalgar Square with David Gower and I remember walking home through London with my wife after the crowds cleared. All the way back I was feeling an extraordinary contradiction of euphoric happiness at the summer that had gone and the terrible sadness of losing the coverage.'
