Commentators Discuss Championship Manager’s Influence on Their Broadcasts

The newest installment of the BBC Sounds podcast, “The Commentators’ View,” features BBC Radio 5 Live’s Ian Dennis and Conor McNamara exploring the impact of computer games on their commentary work. While employed at BBC Radio Leeds, Dennis found that the popular computer game Championship Manager assisted him during his commentary for a match involving Tottenham and Leeds United. Dennis stated, “It was Mark Chapman who got me into Championship Manager/Football Manager when I lived with him in the late 1990s.” He continued, “I remember doing a game with Norman Hunter when I was at Radio Leeds, and it was Tottenham against Leeds United at White Hart Lane.” “Tottenham needed to try and get a goal late on, and they brought on Gary Doherty, – a big central defender, ginger hair, Irish, but he also had the ability to play up front as well.” Dennis recounted, “So Norman was saying, ‘I don’t understand this’, but because I’d been playing Championship Manager I could say, ‘Well actually…’. “At that point he was a utility player, he could play both at the back and up front, so I knew he was going to go up front.” While the game proved helpful for Dennis, a fellow commentator indicated that the Ireland international contributed to his need to “give up playing that game.” McNamara explained, “I stopped playing Championship Manager when I started working as a commentator,” adding, “because in the game, Gary Doherty could sign for Sunderland and be a really prominent player, and in your head you think, ‘he played for Sunderland, he scored loads of goals for Sunderland’.” He concluded, “That distorted reality! I had to shut that out of my life and concentrate on the actual real world!” The complete episode is accessible on BBC Sounds Sandi Toksvig appears alongside Gyles Brandreth, Lulu, Emmanuel Sonubi, and Alan Davies Take the microphone for Queen, Taylor Swift, Bon Jovi, Katy Perry, and others… Ben Fogle and Kate Humble return for the celebrations at Longleat Safari Park Covering topics from microplastics in our atmosphere, ground, and aquatic systems, to the scope of food waste during this season © 2024 BBC. The BBC bears no responsibility for material found on external websites. Information regarding our external linking policy is available.