Among male readers of Simplicity Blog I hope I am not alone in never really growing up. I’m 54 and one day I guess I will be forced to become an adult.
Occasionally something will make me laugh uncontrollably in that schoolboy playground way. This is a ‘boy thing’ I suspect and female readers of Simplicity Blog may or may not find this ‘You Tube’ video funny.
It features the late great Brian Johnston a much loved BBC cricket commentator and his much younger commentary colleague Jonathan Agnew who was 'learning the ropes' under his great mentor.
The year was 1991 and this was a live BBC radio broadcast.
Jonathan Agnew describes Ian Botham's freak dismissal where he fell over his own stumps, with the immortal "just couldn't quite get his leg over".
Brian Johnston desperately tries to maintain control of his hysteria and retain his professionalism while attempting to sum up the day's play, while Agnew sinks further and further into helpless laughter. Eventually both of them completely lose it and burst into uncontrollable laughter. It sounds hilarious
Each time I hear this, it makes me laugh more. It is only 1 minute 20 seconds of commentary and is one of the funniest ever live radio clips.
Enjoy.
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6 comments:
I'm with you, Trevor. In my head, I'm 12 years old, and probably always will be.
I heard someone say they plan to die young as late as possible... sounds like a good plan to me.
Too right Dan – well said!
One of my great icon heroes is former Labour Party politician Tony Been who is now 82 and going strong after more than 50 years as an elected MP – Tony says
“Having left Parliament to devote more time to politics I am free: Lots of experience and no personal ambition. I can't wait for April 3 2025 when I shall have completed my first hundred years and a new century of work begins” - Tony Benn
And speaking of young old people, check out today's post on my blog. I found a photo of my great-great grandfather, who was definitely a young man for many, many decades!
Brilliant - well done Dan - I would love to do some work on my family history
Just to close off the afternoon I was tempted to listen to Jonners and Aggers again, but decided against – I laughed so much earlier that I felt exhausted and had to lie down for a while!
Perhaps for the benefit of your non-cricket savvy audience you should have pointed out that the gentleman who didn’t quite manage to get his leg over had quite a reputation (allegedly) for doing just that. I suspect that is why the commentators found it quite so funny. Isn’t it great to hear professionals completely fall apart!
Ian Botham was one of those people who always managed to make something happen – there was never a dull moment when he was playing. It is pleasing to see him rewarded with a knighthood in the recent honours list. Anyone who can play cricket like him and then go on to raise over £10 million for charity deserves a K, to use fashionable parlance.
By the way, what happened to your rumoured K?!
And is Tony Been Rowan Atkinson’s brother? I’ll leave you to explain that to your overseas audience!
Thanks David and glad you liked the clip – it really is hilarious. I decided not to even attempt to describe anything about cricket because it would have sent my overseas friends to sleep.
Ian Botham is a great man who fully deserves his knighthood – he is so modest about his achievements both in cricket and since he started raising millions of pounds for charities.
The Tony Benn mis-spelling was deliberate of course just to see if you would notice it.
I have as much chance of getting a Knighthood as we have of seeing Lampard play well for England :-)
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