In the warm afterglow of a fine England victory and on the perfect sort of spring day to get out and watch a match, football and broadcasting came together to bid their final farewells to John Motson.
It was cool and clear, bright and breezy and there was not a sheepskin coat in sight as a parade of familiar faces gathered to join family and friends to pay their last respects to the man they called Motty, at Crownhill’s Oak Chapel in Milton Keynes.
There was Sir Trevor Brooking, Bob Wilson and David Pleat. There was Mark Lawrenson, Garth Crooks, Mark Bright, Gary Mabbutt and Martin Keown. It would have made a decent team back in the day.
There was Jim Rosenthal and Ray Stubbs. With these ex-players turned pundits and presenters, it was like a potted history of Match of the Day through the 1980s and 90s.
Representatives came from clubs near to his heart including Barnet, where Motty started his career in journalism and retained strong ties, and Milton Keynes Dons, his local team since retiring to a village in north Buckinghamshire.
Ex-players, pundits and presenters gathered on Friday for the funeral of John Motson
The legendary broadcaster passed away in February at the age of 77 after a storied career
There were club ties and blazers, floral tributes designed like club crests and the odd football scarf.
All this with a little bit of Kirsty MacColl and a little bit of Tennyson. Naturally there was the Cup final hymn Abide With Me, because the FA Cup shot Motty to fame, on the microphone for the BBC when non-League Hereford stunned Newcastle with goals by Ronnie Radford and Ricky George in February 1972.
‘Unforgettable,’ said Ian Noakes, an independent celebrant who led the funeral service. Nobody could disagree.
Everyone present, from those seated inside the chapel to those standing at the back and those crowded outside in a hush as they listened to the feed crackling through the speakers, all smiled because it was impossible not to imagine Motty’s excitable commentary, every bit as integral to that Hereford tie as the mud-heap pitch at Edgar Street and Radford’s wild, arms aloft celebration.
Just as we were all able to close our eyes and hear the same unmistakable tones opining on the Crazy Gang and the Culture Club final, the crazy, mazy Ricky Villa goal for Tottenham or Michel Platini inspiring a fabulous France team as they charged towards a European title.
‘He was part of the fabric of football life for a generation,’ said Noakes. ‘Providing the commentary to our lives. We all felt we knew Motty. He was there through moments of triumph, elation and despair.’
His former colleagues Mark Lawrenson (L), Ray Stubbs (C) and Garth Crooks (R) were there
A number of clubs, including Tottenham Hotspur, left floral tributes to the broadcaster
Milton Keynes Dons chairman Pete Winkelman attended to represent the club Motson had supported since his retirement in 2018
Indeed he was. It explains the sense of loss even for those who never met the man. His wife Anne and son Fred wanted to make it clear they understood the public grief.
Many of the tributes, they said, had been a source of strength since his passing on February 23, at the age of 77.
Bill Hamilton, close friend, colleague for many years and fellow veteran journalist of the BBC, hailed him as ‘football’s undisputed grandmaster of the microphone’.
And he recalled how once, when they shared a house, he had been woken by a noise in the dead of night and stumbled through the darkness fearing intruders only to find Motty crouched over the Subbuteo set, practising his commentary.
‘Fans loved John because he saw the game through their eyes, he was a true and genuine lover of the game,’ said Hamilton, who also joked about his friend’s untidiness and annual shopping sprees at Aquascutum in Regent Street.
Motty’s son Fred, a university lecturer, recalled impromptu kickabouts in the hall with Howard Wilkinson, then manager of Leeds, and raised a smile with tales of his father’s perennial struggle with advancing technology.
The legendary broadcaster was described by the BBC’s Bill Hamilton as ‘football’s undisputed grandmaster of the microphone’
He shared their conversation from a couple of decades ago about text messages. Motty had heard of them and wanted to know what they were, how they worked and whether he might check his mobile phone to see if he had any. He did have some. He had 3,400 unread text messages.
So there were regular outbreaks of laughter amid the tears as the stories evoked such vivid memories and never failed to reference his friendship and generosity, nor his talent or devotion to a job he adored.
It took him from the Barnet Press in the 1960s to the Sheffield Morning Telegraph and into the BBC for decades before a short twilight spell at talkSPORT.
More than that, it secured him a place for ever more in the heart of millions who were lucky enough to grow up in what was a golden age for football on television.
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