Sports Letters: Talking nonsense

Sir: Your elegant article on Dan Maskell by Stephen Ward should be required reading by all our well known football commentators: ' . . . to the eternal relief of millions he never fell into the common trap of describing what was obvious to anyone with their eyes open'.

John Motson, Brian Moore, to a lesser degree Barry Davies; on Sky we have the awful Andy Gray with a voice to open a beer-can at 10 paces. In the name of a merciful providence why can't they shut up for a few moments?

'So today we have Gary Hardcastle sitting in the back four. When he played in the local team his mother washed the shirts and his brother . . .'

'Oh] Bad luck, the ball's gone just over the bar', where the latest pounds 2m forward has smashed the ball 6ft over the bar from five yards out. We can see it all] Don't they know they are on TV? In the moments when the chatterer draws breath 'Big John', the current manager of Ragged Arse Rovers, pops up with some blindingly obvious remarks.

Talk about verbal diarrhoea, these commentators suffer from drivelling dysentry.

TREVOR FFOULKES

Wallington, Surrey

12 December

Gold standards