Originally Posted by The Difference:
“At the end his leg of this morning's coverage, Mike Bovill thanked Rupert Bell, John Anderson, Russell Hargreaves, Jeff Probyn, Chris Sheasby, Michael Owen and some of the members of talkSPORT's London-based production team, which suggests their involvement in the station's coverage is now over. Mike labelled Rupert (whose excellent commentary on South Africa v Samoa this Friday received a lot of praise both on Twitter and on the radio) as talkSPORT's "undoubted star of the tournament" and they went to the break with a montage of his commentaries.
Thanks for posting the details of their quarter-final plans, although without intending any rudeness I don't think you'd need to be a genius to have worked out who'd be doing what next weekend. I assume it'll be Mark Saggers, John Taylor and Brian Moore at Eden Park on both days, with Mike Bovill conducting the England interviews on Saturday; with Andrew McKenna at the Wellington International Stadium on the two days with Scott Quinnell and Paul Wallace both contributing on Saturday and David Campese doing co-commentary on Sunday. It'll be interesting if their plans remain as above with Campo doing both Wellington quarter-finals, as that should mean we'll have a four man commentary team for Ireland v Wales.
Looking further ahead, I guess John Taylor will do commentary on the final four games of the tournament, with Brian Moore and either Quinnell or Wallace on the Northern Hemisphere semi-final and with Campese and possibly Moore as well on the Southern Hemisphere semi-final. His co-commentators for the final and third place games will likely depend on the teams involved, although I'd expect Moore to be present for the final.”
interesting to read this Difference, I didn't listen to any of the coverage today. I'm a bit surprised that Rupert Bell isn't being kept on just because he seemed to be their second choice commentator behind JT. He may have other commitments though? I've not heard Andrew Mckenner commentate so can't comment but, from hearing him report in the past he clearly knows his rugby so I'll look forward to his commentary of Wales v Ireland which will be absolutely huge here in Wales next Saturday morning.
I also wanted to praise TS for their coverage of the England v Scotland game yesterday. I thought it worked really well with John Taylors very measured commentary with Moore and Hastings providing the passion for their respective countries, good work!
as a blind listener, i rely on the radio commentary and John Taylor has really improved in things like describing where the ball is on the pitch etc. at the start of the tournament he was clearly a bit rusty on radio commentary which isn't surprising I guess considering he is primarily a TV commentator. the last couple of commentaries I've heard from him though have been fantastic, as has been the whole TS coverage in general.