Tony Adamson

Tony Adamson first went on the air in 1960. “I was a national serviceman then”, said Tony, “and I managed to persuade the Forces Broadcasting Service in Libya that I might be God’s gift to sports broadcasting”.

His first experience, as a boxing commentator, was going well until a bucket of iced water overturned on to his meticulously prepared research.

He joined BBC local radio at Oxford in 1970. “It was a wonderful experience” he recalls, ranging from producing the fishing programme Tight Lines to commentating on the Boat Race. “It took me some time” said Tony “to get used to the fact that the crews went backward.”

He joined the BBC Radio Sport and Outside Broadcasts Unit in London in 1977 and became Tennis Correspondent at Wimbledon as well as fronting the shop window programmes on Saturday afternoons.

He was appointed Golf Correspondent in 1989. “The best job in the department” he describes it. “It takes me all over the world following the most approachable international sportsmen and women in the most idyllic locations. The only trouble is the more I watch the great players play, the higher my handicap becomes. Can somebody please explain!”