Henry Blofeld made cricket fun for all but TMS has bottled his spirit | The Spin


The ‘irreplaceable’ commentator has departed with his Wooster-ish catchphrases yet the TMS box is still a rich mix of cricketing life

So long then, my dear old thing. After 45 years on Test Match Special, Henry Blofeld has, to borrow one of his own favourite phrases, put his cue back on the rack. English cricket will never sound quite the same again. It hardly could, given the unique, deep Cholmondley-Warner timbre of his voice. From now on, then, TMS listeners will find there are far fewer pigeons strutting around the outfield, and not nearly so many jet planes flying overhead or bright red busses driving by the boundary walls. The flipside being that they’re rather more likely to know exactly who it was that just made the catch at third man. Punctiliousness never was a notable quality of his commentaries.

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