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Eddie Hemings hanging up the mic


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Whoever it is. Please can we have some commentary on the match that shows how things are going with enthusiasm and continuation.  So often we get side tracked about players pasts and what has happened to the commentators. All this time the match is going on and becomes a side show feature to the speakers views and matters that have nothing to do with the game in hand.

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I think Eddie and Stevie were a breath of fresh air when they started commentating on Rugby League and were several notches better than the presentation we had seen before.

Times change though and both became stale and repetitive, both arguably staying on a decade too long, and it's a good thing that Eddie is now following Stevie in retiring. All the best to him though because he is undeniably a fan who always had the games best interests at heart.

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As all commentators do, Eddie seems to get a lot of stick, I think much of it is unwarranted, he is a very good commentator and broadcaster, maybe he should have gone a season or two ago but he has been very good IMHO, I have seen the last couple of years that he has got more and more hung up on refereeing decisions but to be honest I blame that on the strange decision to have an ex referee in the commentary box!

 

I thin from the current crop, Brian Carney and John Wells are both excellent. I also like Dave Woods on the BBC.

And for a bit of a controversial view and don't actually mind Barry and Terry, they are used too much but they don't bother me.

 

Not sure who I'd like to take over, I love listening to Voss commentating I think he's p there with the best but I'm not sure he would be right as the main commentator over here.

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Voss is the best in the business by a distance . Loves and has great knowledge of the British game . If there was half a chance I’d sack all of these and give him their wages to get him , but he’s in a great thing as lead comms and presenter on Fox

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Quality from Eddie the other night , after spotting a player with a black eye  , he pointed out that Sam Tomkins was in the studio with a ' shiner ' last week as well " I thought you'd retired Barry " , bloody brilliant

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Good luck to him in his retirement.

I guess after doing it for so long we were always going to be a tad over familiar with his style, but I like Eddie, always seemed decent to me.

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15 minutes ago, Chrispmartha said:

As all commentators do, Eddie seems to get a lot of stick, I think much of it is unwarranted, he is a very good commentator and broadcaster, maybe he should have gone a season or two ago but he has been very good IMHO, I have seen the last couple of years that he has got more and more hung up on refereeing decisions but to be honest I blame that on the strange decision to have an ex referee in the commentary box!

 

I thin from the current crop, Brian Carney and John Wells are both excellent. I also like Dave Woods on the BBC.

And for a bit of a controversial view and don't actually mind Barry and Terry, they are used too much but they don't bother me.

 

Not sure who I'd like to take over, I love listening to Voss commentating I think he's p there with the best but I'm not sure he would be right as the main commentator over here.

To be fair it's being a good commentator to ask their co commentators questions and bring them in, so for a technical question you ask the technical commentator, they have a referee as commentator so he is just doing his job!

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Commentating is a very different beast to creating journalistic packages, studio chat or conducting live interviews. Eddie has certainly conducted himself superbly in this regard.

Trouble is, no one else currently associated with the Sky Sports presentation team seems naturally capable of engaging commentary. 

The role should be advertised, but given the time frame involved it would seem like it is a done deal.

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29 minutes ago, DavidM said:

Voss is the best in the business by a distance . Loves and has great knowledge of the British game . If there was half a chance I’d sack all of these and give him their wages to get him , but he’s in a great thing as lead comms and presenter on Fox

Yes, he's a natural and one of the best in ANY sport, let alone RL.

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He has been a big part of all our RL-watching for many years and I hope all is well behind the scenes.

This is long overdue though and he has been phoning it in for years.

I can confirm 30+ less sales for Scotland vs Italy at Workington, after this afternoons test purchase for the Tonga match, £7.50 is extremely reasonable, however a £2.50 'delivery' fee for a walk in purchase is beyond taking the mickey, good luck with that, it's cheaper on the telly.

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lets hope a review is undertaken.

Phil Clarke and Stuart Cummings to be removed from the commentary box. If you need a ref to explain calls then do it at half time.

Would love someone like Phil Kinsella to do the TV.

No to JJB that accent is too thick for 80 mins, like Denis Betts accent.

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14 minutes ago, Sparse Attendance said:

What’s the RL lover John Inverdale doing nowadays ?. 

Ruining televised Tennis on various channels.

Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The timing's odd for Eddie to be off just as the season gets under way, so I hope it isn't health-related. He was always the more bearable of the double act with Stevo, and his voice is inextricably linked with so many moments of triumph, disaster or "what on Earth is Gelling doing now?"

Best of luck to him, and I'm very interested to see who becomes his long-term replacement.

Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Yes hope it’s not health related - I know he wasn’t too well a few years back.

Anyway, Eddie was employed by BSB back in the day when we were just sprouting as a regularly televised sport.   He did a job and did it well for the first couple of decades of Super League.   I’ll look back on it nostalgically like I do when I think of Ray French and BBC cup games in the afternoon.

However, the face of the sport is changing and we are desperately trying to reinvent ourselves, refresh our image and prepare ourselves for a very different future of sport.   I agree with most others that it’s time for a complete overhaul of commentary and presentation and for me that includes making things more professional looking and less moulded into something that seems to be aimed purely at a fictional classic northern ‘working-class’ audience that some low-quality sitcom writer would create.

Let’s focus on a few quality presenters -  not necessarily all ex-players - and some decent technical analysis (I like Jon Wells’ input).   For those with strong regional dialects, let’s provide some of the speech training that newsreaders undergo so that those neutrals outside the homelands don’t switch off after struggling to understand the commentary by the first set of 6 tackles.

A decent mix of males/females and backgrounds.   Let’s not forget Eddie Hemings himself wasn’t a RL sports journalist in the early days.

Thanks for the memories Eddie, now let’s look forward to the next era ?

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39 minutes ago, Red Willow said:

lets hope a review is undertaken.

Phil Clarke and Stuart Cummings to be removed from the commentary box. If you need a ref to explain calls then do it at half time.

Would love someone like Phil Kinsella to do the TV.

No to JJB that accent is too thick for 80 mins, like Denis Betts accent.

Personally, I would like to hear a more neutral accented commentator.  We were discussing the powerful tones of Ray Warren last weekend.  Someone close to that would be good.

As much as Stuart Cummings might be a nice man, he bores me to death and adds nothing.  

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Rabbits or someone of his style would be brilliant, totally impartial, extremely knowledgeable, always highlights the positives and a good sense of humour to tie it all together. Who could Sky employ that could fit that description?

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9 minutes ago, Wolford6 said:

Left field option, and a good one:

Harry Gration

Agree, let's blood the young'uns.

I can confirm 30+ less sales for Scotland vs Italy at Workington, after this afternoons test purchase for the Tonga match, £7.50 is extremely reasonable, however a £2.50 'delivery' fee for a walk in purchase is beyond taking the mickey, good luck with that, it's cheaper on the telly.

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