Test Match Special - #40from40: Ken Bruce

Episode Date: July 30, 2020

Radio 2 presenter and host of Popmaster Ken Bruce joins Jonathan Agnew for a fascinating chat at Headingley in 2013.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Bring more gear, carry more passengers, face greater challenges. Welcome to the world of Defender, with seating up to eight, ample cargo space and legendary off-road capability. It's built to make the most of every adventure. Learn more at landrover.ca. The Boundary on BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Jonathan Agnew. Welcome along to another classic view from the boundary from Test Match special. As cricket lovers, we're used to watching the clock throughout the morning

and keeping an eye on when play is due to start. And for millions of listeners to BBC Radio 2, there's a similar feeling as they look forward to 10.30 when it's time for Popmaster, the iconic radio music quiz. Well, the long-time presenter of Radio 2's mid-morning program and host of Popmaster, is Ken Bruce. Born in Glasgow, Ken has worked for Radio 2 since 1980 and was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2008. And in 2013, he popped up to see us at a test between England and New Zealand at Headingley and began by talking about his love of sport on the radio. I got into several sports because of the radio commentaries,

because of the quality of the radio commentaries. I was always a bit of a tennis fan as well, but it was only when I heard Max Robertson doing Wimbledon commentaries. And I thought, cross-court pocket. You could hardly keep up with it, and how he could do it. I don't know. But I just thought it was a magnificent bit of broadcasting.

And TMS has a different feel to a different kind of aura around it. But the sport is always there. It's always important. It's always sacrosanct. But around it, you have this marvellous, conversational, discursive style,

which is just, there's nothing quite like it. Which could only happen on radio. You couldn't possibly do this on television. But radio is all about personal communication. one-to-one communication. In days gone by, during the war, people used to sit around their radios and listen to Itmar, something like that.

You know, before or five of them, that's not happened for 60 years. People listen to radio one person alone, almost always. Even if you're in a house and it's on in the kitchen, you're still alone, really, listening to that radio program because everybody else around you

is just flitting in and out. They're not with you. It's not a communal experience. Radio is a singular experience. and anybody who forgets that when they're working on radio is missing the entire point I think it's such a warm

medium isn't it I mean you really can reach out and do all sorts of things to your listener you can tease them you can play with them you can make them happy you can make them sad

it's something that television just hasn't got television's always aimed at an audience rather than a person it's always aimed at hello you know all of you out there

whereas radio is aimed at hello yes And it's like, I always think it's like talking to a friend on the telephone. When you're talking to somebody on the phone, you adopt a completely different style to the way you would when you're face to face. So if you're talking in the radio, you'll be talking as if you're talking to somebody you know well, somebody perhaps even a member of your family, but somebody who lives a long way away. So you've got to explain a few things. But it's that kind of personal, it is a two-way conversation because you get a lot back from listeners,

even if it's not immediate and it's not in their voice. but it is a dialogue and I think as long as you remember it's one person talking to another person then you can't go wrong but these days though with social networking I mean it is in touch isn't it? I mean we go there's some funny

people out there. Great lines very witty which I'll steal quite happily. Of course that's such a job I do it every single day in my life no but it's great you put up an idea and somebody will come back with a really killer line on Twitter or a text or something on an email and

You can use it right away. In years gone by, when I started on Radio 2, you could start a thread of conversation, but you'd have to wait four days for the first postcard to come back. And you could still refer to it three weeks down the line. You have to keep it going somewhere. Now it can be all over in half an hour. Yes. I usually curse first.

I think, why did not think of that? And then steal it. I mean, it's always that bit first. So just in case you think I'm guilty, yes, I am guilty about doing it. What I love is people send me jokes which are just unable to be broadcast. And they must know that when they send them. They're sending it for my entertainment, which I think is really nice. You know, I'll laugh and I read that, but I know I won't be able to read it out.

And they know that too. And I think that's a really special part of it as well. So I count cricket. Yeah. It's funny when you talk about Scotland and cricket. There's a sort of assumption south of the border amongst a lot of people. It's football up there and you toss the cabre a bit and that's about it. And that there isn't any cricket.

But of course there is. There is a lot. It's a wonderful network of club cricket and they're a decent side to the South Scotland and that's where it began for you. Yeah, we played cricket at our school. I went to quite a so-called good school and it was rugby in the winter

and cricket in the summer. I wasn't really much of a rugby player because I was quite small and wiry and still am of course. Good job, it's ready. And I wasn't really a great rugby player They put me at standoff, I think. And they said, could you stand a bit further off for ideal play?

But in cricket, I was a bit better. But I had very bad eyes, although I didn't realize at the time. I only discovered this many years later when I was trying to shoot clay pigeons. And I was missing every single one. And the instructor said, close the other eye. And I closed the other eye. You know how he closed an eye to focus. I closed the other eye and started hitting everything.

And he said, that's master eye. And I don't know whether that's an oculus' term. It certainly isn't shooting, apparently, and I discovered that that's why I kept missing the ball when I was trying to catch it, because I was using the wrong eye to focus. And you couldn't help yourself, is a natural thing to do? You know, if you say, look at that, it looks through a keyhole, you close one eye immediately. But I was, you know, if you close one eye, you'll notice that the field of your vision, your binocular vision, changes. It should change only slightly, but when I close one eye, it changes massively because I'm closing the wrong eye. If I close the other eye, which is really quite difficult, I close my mouth to do it as well as you can possibly.

I wish you could see these faces being pulled, by the way. I'm starting to look at Popeye. Yeah. So my eyes basically were dodgy, so that's why I wasn't ever really a great sport. But I was good at running. I was a good runner. So we'd throw you a catch, and you'd just miss it by miles.

I'd be there, and it would just go right past my hand. Well, well, that's extraordinary. Frightening. Yeah. Otherwise, who knows, I could have been playing for... You might. If not England, Scotland. You might have been.

So I guess that, yes, from a playing perspective, it's tricky to overcome that, I think. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I didn't even know about it until many years later. I just thought I was a duffer. Yes. And I probably am, but that's my excuse. Yeah.

Did you battle bowl? I was quite a decent, a very accurate bowler. Slow, very slow bowler. Yes. I mean, I was very accurate. If they hadn't seen the ball coming, I'd have skittled the wickets. But because I was so slow, they could practically have gone off for smoke and come back and still hit it. So sort of lobbing.

Yeah, I was really kind of very slow. Just going, oh, don't. And, uh, and, you know, I was really, you know. If they hadn't noticed, if they looked the other way, then I could take the wicked, but otherwise, no chance. Who did you have sort of role models up there? I mean, presumably, although you were in Scotland and very proudly Scottish, you look south of the border for your heroes.

You couldn't see any cricket on television from Scotland. There was no Scottish cricket broadcast. So those were the glory days, of course, of test matches being broadcast on a daily basis live on terrestrial television. Yes. Who were you watching? then on your black and white set who could you see there through the snow

Jim Laker I just watched his performances well what a great bowler you know fantastic Jim Laker and in later years I loved watching Ian Botham all the while thinking

I'm sort of glad that he's not going out with my daughter or something like that but just you know he's not the sort of chap I'd like to cross in a pub but still I'm a wonderful cricketer and these days a wonderful guy. But in those days, a bit of a loose canon, but sort of thrilling to watch.

A man who could literally change a game, single-handedly change a game. I did it here. Yeah, indeed, in this very place. This is probably the most famous changing of a game that has ever been. You don't seem to get people who can do the all round us who can change a game, take it by the scruff of the neck,

and be so determined that they will do something that it will change the game. Yes, and do you get along now to see cricket? Not as much I used to go, I used to go, try to get to the Oval Test every year, but I haven't been able to do that. Well, I've got a young family, and I live outside London now, so it's not quite so easy as it was. But maybe one day, when they're getting a bit older,

and I can afford the time, I'll start going again. It was only over one day a year to a test match, but it was worth it. It's a great day. I mean, those who've never been to a test match, it's a lovely day, just as you are today, sitting at the sunshine. I mean, it's marvellous, absolutely, beautiful. And you get up and go. away and have a drink and get a packet of crisps or a pie or something like that.

And the conversation that goes on round about you. And the crowd, I mean, there's some bloke sitting next to me who are three young guys who are dressed as Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman. I just think that's, you don't seem to get that at any other sporting event. No, you don't. I suppose it's quite fun, isn't it? And the wigs and, I'm looking now, there's a chap in a toga down there. I think I can see some of the Roman emperor or something.

I don't know. I'd never quite worked out. The sort of thought process, though, to the fancy dressing going to cricket. The British love dressing up, don't they? Particularly as women. And there's a great tradition, of course, of men dressing as women,

boys dressing as women in theatre and Shakespeare and things like that. And Gilbert and Sullivan, stuff like that. You know, schools always did that. They do all the female parts as boys. I don't know, maybe it's something deep in our psyche. So you seem very traditional to me, Ken. I might be completely wrong. So you're a test match sort of a man rather than a 2020.

Yeah, 2020 is a fantastically exciting spectacle, but it's not the real thing. You know, I think, you know, a test match, it's an important thing. And I don't know if people really, it's a bit like classical music. You only develop a full appreciation of it as you get older, I think. You know, and you can start off with bubble gum pop and move on to heavier stuff and whatever. But classical music, you think you'll start with Johann Strauss or something, you'll end up with Shostakovich or worse. And I think test matches are something,

you watch a 2020 match and you think, that's great. But then you'll say, oh, a test match. And it's so much more interesting. There's so much more going on, so much more strategy involved. And a decision, you know, one decision can change the whole nature of a test match. And that's what makes it interesting.

It's kind of, I don't know, it's almost like, you know, some kind of wartime, strategy move, you know, when you're watching differing sides moving forward. And I think, you know, a test match at its best could be that. That's why I think the Saturday of a test match normally

is the most interesting day. The third day. Things start to turn on a Saturday. I talked about your job with the Eurovision. I'd love to be a DJ. Yeah, everybody would be great. Yeah, yeah.

Well, it is such fun, actually. I've been doing it a long time, but I only keep doing it because it's fun. You come in every day. and you get to play nice music, great music, you know, and... That you've chosen yourself, or had any input in yourself? I have input, there's a producer, this is the BBC. Yes, the producer's word is law, as you know, as you well know, well, he tries to...

Let them think that, let them think that, anyway, well, that's the art, isn't it? Let them believe that. Yes. But it's... The producer chooses the music, but we talk about it constantly, about what style of music, what kind of music should do in the programme. And if there's something that I don't likely puts in, I'll say, I'm not playing that. And he'll say, okay.

And for something I think, can we play so-and-so now, and suddenly get a rush of blood about something? He'll say, yeah, and I put it in. So it's very much give and take. But I, you know, I bow to Gary, my producer. He is the boss, and he chooses the music. I presume when you were starting up, you were using the good old, you know, proper vinyl.

Are you spinning discs, as I used? But now, are you also pushing buttons or computerized? It's all on hard disk now. whereas before it was all vinyl. And of course, I started in the 80s and Radio 2, and we were still playing quite a lot of old stuff from the 60s, as indeed we do still sometimes. But it was all singles or albums.

So you define the track. Very often, the track itself would last two and a half minutes. So the time you'd found track 3 on Side 2, found the beginning of it, listened to it, pre-fade it, back and forth to find the first note, and then half a turn or quarter of a turn back to let it run up to speed. But the time you'd done that, there was only about 20 seconds left before you had to speak.

So it was very reactive. Now, it's all on hard disk. You can listen to everything. You can actually listen to the end of something while it's playing on air, which my old tech brain still can't quite get right. But it's all there. And you can send something straight back to the start as soon as you've listened to it. So it gives you more time to think.

Absolutely. But my career was a disaster. I did spin discs briefly at Radio Leicester. Right. It ended quite swiftly when I'm afraid I did play one at the wrong speed, which is just... Oh, that's hardly sackable.

No, no, no, no. I think you were very harshly treated. I've played them backwards. I've played records backwards in the past. How'd you do that? Well, there used to be a function where you could return to zero when the next generation of Gramdex,

as we called them, came in, there was that once you'd set the top of the record once you found the start point and you played it for a few seconds there was a little button you could press which return to zero and so it would go backwards play backwards but of course if you left the fader up then it was going out all the so I've done that

yeah yeah yeah and I've taken the needle off while the record's playing in the reddit on air and then thumped it back down again and off it goes again oh yeah well I think they were very harsh there must have been another reason well I don't think of the programme organiser

He's heard. Dear old chap called Roger, so the worst piece of radio had ever heard. Worst piece of radio? Yes. And he was quite old. He obviously wasn't listening. He must have missed me. But did you get rid of your mistakes earlier, then? Did you get rid of your mistakes on local radio?

No, no, no, I'm still making them. But I just know how to get out of them now, better. When you're young, you make a mistake, you think, oh, my, you think it's the end of the world. And you go blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you don't know what I say. And now I make a mistake, I'll just say, sorry about that. No, you can say sorry, I just say. Just be honest about it. Yeah, I just say, you know, that's what you get when you hire an old person to do these things, and you just move on.

So, yeah, the mistake still happened, but you cover them better. Yeah. And what you have done, Ken, I can say this, you couldn't say this, but you have been so successful without having been a celeb who's been planted behind a microphone. You know, you have done it through personality, character, voice skill. I mean, that was very proud of that, actually. I don't know about pride. I think I've been quite lucky and while tastes have changed,

while recruitment policies have changed, I've still kept there. But when I started, I wanted to be an all-round broadcaster. And there were people. I mean, dear O'Brien Johnston, it was an all-round broadcaster. He was out doing reports for in-town tonight

in the 50s, you know, and stopping people in the street. Do you remember those? Only just. Only just. And then, of course, became a, cricket commentator as well as everything else he did, but that became his speciality. And I wanted to be an all-round broadcaster. I think I'm the sort of person you could say tomorrow go and do this, go and do that, go and do a football

commentary. I mean, I'd struggle, but I would make it sound sort of professional. I wouldn't be as good as the professional football commentant, the full-time ones, but I could just about sort of cover myself. Of course. And maybe even here I could just about cover myself as a cricket commentator. Not brilliantly, but I'll put you on in a minute, No, no, no, no, no. Sorry, I was not angling at all. But I'd sort of get away with it, because I know, I know the form. I know how things are, and I'm not frightened by radio. I've always felt completely at home in a radio studio and with a microphone on.

It doesn't bother me in the slightest. Put me on television and on the stage, television I don't like particularly, because there's too many people, there's too many things in the way. Yes. And it's too much technology. It doesn't feel like cameras, you know, you're putting on a show, you're on your best suit, you've got made. makeup on, it's not natural. Stage I prefer, I quite like being on stage, quite enjoy that,

because you've got a direct contact with your audience. But radio, you know, I really always feel like a fish in water. Yes, it's funny, isn't it? And I feel awkward being in a studio these days. Because it feels sterile and quiet and no one says anything and the door opens. We are constantly used to just Malcolm having a cup of tea and people clattering in and out. When I came in here, I was very quiet, but I thought everybody else was talking. Oh, no, I was sort of whispering, you know, because that's a radio environment. No, no, no, no. It's just, oh, oh, you're right, and that isn't the thing?

Which is lovely. That's great. It's very natural and easy. And that's, of course, the charm of TMS. You were here when Jeffrey Boycott gave me. Is that the first time you've encountered the great man? It is, actually, yes, yes. He doesn't take prisoners.

But he never did. He never did. No, no, that's true. I've asked about Terry Wogan, who's someone I often talk about when I speak, because he wasn't a sort of natural broadcaster, And as Brian Johnston clearly was, we mentioned him a few times today. To expect it to follow Terry Logan on something as intimate as we've both established that radio is, that must have been a tough call.

Did you think about that in a... This was back in 1985 when I was brought down full-time to Radio 2. And Terry had just left the breakfast show for the first time. He was a serial lever, I'm afraid, on Terry. He kept resigning, you know, twice. and 40 years or something. But he went off to television. And they offered me the job.

And I thought, well, this could end in disaster. But if I don't take it, then I'll think for the rest of my life, why didn't I take that job? And if I had said, no, there's no guarantee that would have said, oh, well, all right, we'll put somebody else in there and give you their job. No, that would not have happened. So I thought, I have to do this and hope against hope that it works.

Well, it didn't work at breakfast because I'm not a breakfast person, I don't think. But they moved me to 9.30 the year after, and I've been there with just a couple of years break in the middle ever since. So it was as much as having to get up early and having to sound, however breakfast people sound, if you like, it was an issue rather than just following someone like him. And I think we probably sounded similar, and I think that confused people and thought, well, where's the difference? And I think if you are going to replace somebody who's an icon, you have to get somebody who is really quite markedly different. and they didn't do that with me

because I had the same kind of pace and the same timbre voice in some ways so I think you know as they did this time with Chris Evans now that's worked brilliantly because Chris is a completely different broadcaster and it's worth absolutely the figures are just shot up

they're fantastic and he's a great guy I love Chris he's fantastic I love Terry I love Chris you could not imagine two more different people they're completely different in every guard but great broadcasters both of them Because, of course, people, because of the way that we are on the radio and that relationship with the listener, they don't like change, do they? I mean, and that is also something that's very difficult for a new person to come in. People like the radio the way that it is.

Yeah. They even hate if I, for instance, do an outside broadcast one day, as we did from Malmo for Eurovision. We did the Friday program live from Malmo. Listeners don't really like it. They don't want that. They want what they had the day before, more or less the same, but slightly. and the regularity is what this is it's like you know your living room you don't want to change the furniture every day you don't want to move around or you'll end up tripping over the

table you know you've got everything you have to know where everything is and so we have Popmaster at the same time every day and of course because people set their life to it their routine to it we've even we get a lot of anecdotal evidence about Popmaster people saying I don't book any interviews or appointments for 10 30 I just I sit in the car park I go out and sit in the car and listen to it if anybody phones me I just kill the call immediately. And we even had a dentist who only books as 10.30 appointments, people who know something about popular music so that they can answer.

While he's doing, they can have a little competition. Although how you've got all that gubbins in about it, you go, I don't know how that quite works. But it's become an appointment to listen, but we didn't know that at the time. We started off 15 years ago just as a kind of, this will run for a few weeks. Absolutely. And it's just a simple sort of a thing. Yeah, but it is it straightforward.

The one thing we do always try to make sure is that we are right. Our questions are right and the answers are right. And if there's any element of doubt, there's usually a line underneath the answer for me to read out saying, of course it was released in 1984, but it didn't actually hit the top spot until February of 1985. Because there are the completists and the detail merchants out there who will know these things. And we have to be 100% right, which we try to get. Yeah, yeah. Colin Breggis, I want to say, how much I enjoy Ken's show every week?

He makes my driving journey much more enjoyable and makes me laugh a lot. He says, what would you do if you were not a broadcaster? What would you be doing? You're an accountant or something. I trained as an accountant. That was terrible. I was really awful. I wasn't really interested.

By that time, it already decided that I wanted to get into radio. With no reason to think that I could, but I decided that's what I wanted to do. So I don't know. I have an interesting little company which runs elderly buses, rootmaster buses. Yes, I've seen this. So maybe I'd run a little company like that. You tried it, don't you?

I'm qualified to drive. I only drive maybe once a year just to keep my hand in, but I am a qualified coach driver, actually. I can drive manual vehicles as well as automatic. That's an unusual thing. Well then, yeah, but it's good fun. It's completely different. It's completely different.

And so it takes you away from what you're doing. And similarly, when I'm not doing, what I'd really love to do is be a drummer in a band, a proper band. I'm a drummer in a dad rock band in our village. It's really a granddad rock band, I suppose. And we haven't yet done any public performances. There are some good reasons for that. But one of these days, we haven't even got a name yet.

No, no. One of our numbers suggested no direction might be a good name. It didn't go down well with everybody. That's a gloomy suggestion. John Ellis and Melbourne is here we go all over the place these days. Can you ask Ken if Popmaster was cricket master? He obviously listens to you in Milan. Oh, yeah.

And there was a three in ten section. What would his three most memorable cricket moments be? That's a pretty difficult question. I said earlier, I'm not a stats man. I can't tell you how many Bradman scored in this match or that match. Or what was something, you know, Botham's figures were. But I always remember this is not a great moment in cricket, but I remember the oval ones when Devin Malcolm was in the outfield.

No, so I'll tell you, I'll tell you. Devin Malcolm came into bat. and he was um i can't remember when this would be um late 90s sometime and uh he just it was not beautiful batting wouldn't be it was not beautiful batting but it was so full of character it was fun and the the crowd were loving it and he was having a good old 20 from ever yeah yeah i do remember it yeah you know a good old white at it and i thought this is just the joy of cricket this is fantastic good old devs eurovision now again we're going to finish with that Are we ever going to win this thing?

Again, we can. We can win it. I mean, a lot of people say the political voting is so intense now in the Eastern Bloc that we'll never overcome that. But we will, we can. We just need to get the right song with the right person. That sounds glib and impossible to achieve. But if we just get the right act, I think these days it now needs to be a young act. If we could get one direction to do it next year, and they'd have nothing to lose,

No, they wouldn't. Think about it. If they did Eurovision and they didn't win, it wouldn't matter. See, I always thought that you had to be an unknown really to go. Isn't that what it used to be? No, no. It's been, because we had Pearl Carr and Teddy Johnson in 1959, which our older listeners will know. You're far too younger.

I don't remember that one. I was eight at the time. But yeah, so they were famous at the time. You can have, with Kenneth McKellar sang for Eurovision, believe it or not. Right. Scottish tenor. Yes. So, and Sandy Shaw was well known when she had puppet on a string. a string. Lulu was well known. So you can have well-known people. I think we need somebody

appeals to the young audience. We need a record that's already out in Europe several weeks before the contest so that people know it. That's important too. But the best song will still win it because we've had Sweden and Denmark winning before. They don't have a huge constituency in the Eastern Bloc. So people are voting for the song because they think it's the best. Once you get beyond the first choice, then they'll start voting for the neighbours. Everybody will do that except the UK we don't vote for Ireland we should do we don't get the idea of territorial voting we must vote for Ireland more all right just to say that but because Ireland tend to vote for us still quite a lot yes they won't next year

because we didn't give them any this year so are we right to take it seriously or not it's an easy thing to poke fun up we really shouldn't take it it's entertainment it's an entertainment it's for the person taking part it's very serious the person taking part but it's not a it's not a be-all-and-all thing for them it's It's just, it's a moment in their career. And dear Bonnie Tyler, who was on this year, she said, well, you know, I've got an album out, this is helping, it's helping sell it, and I've really enjoyed it.

I had no idea it was so much fun. So she's come away from the experience, enjoying it. And if we can win it, then we'll enjoy it even more. Yes. Do you hear all the entries first, or are you sitting there in your little booth and hearing the strange Russian grannies singing for the first time? I have heard and seen them before.

I go to the rehearsal, believe it not, there's a rehearsal. For the whole show. For the whole show. So I sit and make notes on that because I'm having, in my commentary on for radio, I'm having to cast ahead to what's going to be coming on and give them an idea of the appearance, as well as the nature of the song.

So I have to see, I have to know what's coming up next. So I just, I watch that and I make some notes and then I go live on the night itself. Yes. I think you should do it next year. You can really take their Mickey out of people. When you come next year? I'll come about your number two.

Yeah, yeah, we'll do it. The same 20 minutes each. Same as TMS. We're not bringing Jeffrey along as well. What's the future of radio? Can you imagine, because it's all, with all the downloads and these things are talking about, you're pushing button in your studio now.

Music radio, can you see, imagine people still listening to music radio in 30 years' time, still that voice coming out of their car radio or maybe? Yes, because a number of times, the last 30 years, I've been told radio is dying. It's a dead medium. It will be dead in five years because of this. And this comes along, whatever it is.

You know, the MP3 player was the first thing. Well, actually, it was the Walkman, wasn't it? That's right. Who will need radio when you've got your Walkman? And people said, well, when the MP3 player comes in, you can choose your own music. Why listen to radio? Well, two things.

On an MP3 player, you'll only ever hear what you've already chosen. You'll never be surprised by any people. of music. You never hear, oh, you'll never get something that you think, oh, I don't know that. What is that? You will on radio, and you won't have that one-to-one communication, the personal communication between one man, one woman in the studio, one man, one woman at home. And that's the magic of radio, and that will always, that will always work. In the 60s, when I was interested in radio at first, they were saying sound radio is dead. It's absolutely dead. Here we are, nearly 60 years on. Still going.

Yeah. How long you keep going for? Have you thought about that? Did you ever give it any thoughts? I have a young family and I... You've got to keep going. I've got to see them. I'd be happy to see them to retirement. Yeah. Ken, it's been lovely to met you.

Thanks for coming along. Great, fantastic honour. I've been listening to TMS for almost all of my life and it's just great to be here. And you can still hear Ken every weekday morning on Radio 2 from 930 and Popmaster is still going strong. If you want to hear any of the other interviews from our 40 from 40 series, there's so many available on BBC. sounds. How about this from Darts commentary legend, Sid Waddell?

As a kid I used to watch, you'd be fascinated by I think it's like Sir Martin Jenkins and Vic were seeing earlier. You look for the great moments. So I remember as a kid, what we used to, it was crazy. We used to see pictures in the boys' annuals of people like Bradman.

On their knee at the end of a pull, sweep slug. But we did know that that was the end of the shot, we thought it was the start. So we used to kneel in the field like this. a hell of a lot of LBWs in Allen games. And I remember Freddie, I remember being in a working men's club up there

when Freddie took the Indians apart, I think it would do all traffic, you know, got about eight wickets. And just the sheer excitement of seeing this sweaty guy come roaring in, you know, arms and bits of his shirt hanging open showing his manly chest. And I think, although I was never in love with the game,

that's why it's good to see the real test match atmosphere here. All the great commentating, I've just seen Mike Gantlin looking for the chutney. You know, first man at lunche he was there at quarterback 12. Yeah, see, I think the fact that you were worse, it was like ice in New Castle as well, and watch Milburn and Shackling. I've seen Shackling D. Tricks at St. James's in the 50s.

And it was that. It was the great players and the great moments. I was also at Hedley when both of them was, you know, I smacked the ball into the hot dog and ice cream stand. And that's my great memories of watching great players. Keep an eye out on social media for details of upcoming classic view from The Boundary interviews

and make sure you miss nothing from Test Match special by subscribing on BBC Sounds. Classic view from the boundary on the TMS podcast. Yergan, Yergan, you're a big fan of the BBC Sounds app. Oh yes, oh yes.

Well, we've heard reports that you've been enjoying the Football Daily podcast on it. I loved it. That makes me quite happy to be honest. Josay, Football Daily is bringing top analysis. and comment on BBC Sounds. How do you feel about that?

Of course, it's the best thing in football. Are you a fan, Ollie? It's one of the best, yeah, definitely. Pep, Football Daily, has some big-named guests. Are you excited to listen? This is a good news for us. The team is really good. Listen to the Football Daily podcast on the BBC Sounds app.

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