Roberts plans to continue commentating AFL on radio and will sign-off from Fox Footy with an interview by his great friend, Mike Sheahan, on Open Mike airing Tuesday 19th March.
Sam Hargreaves called this afternoon’s AFLW match in Brisbane between the Lions and Melbourne for Fox Footy. Hargreaves heads Triple M’s AFL commentary team in the city.
He’s been doing the Brisbane AFLW calls since inception, but I did read an Instagram post somewhere that suggested MMM Brisbane let him go. Perhaps he is going to be used more by Fox to cover Lions and Suns games?
You would think so. Sandy Roberts’ decision to retire from TV means Fox Footy will be down to three main callers: Anthony Hudson, Dwayne Russell and Adam Papalia. With the channel covering up to six matches every week, the trio will be in high demand this season. Eddie McGuire and Brenton Speed can only call a small number of matches due to other commitments while Leigh Montagna is still learning the craft of play by play.
Speed is only ever used when they have 4 games in Saturday’s to cover. His availability is pretty good. Eddie doesn’t call matches on his own really, normally he’s an additional caller to either Russell or Hudson.
My guess is Sam Hargreaves would be used this way. I’d say it will be Anthony Hudson, Dwayne Russell, Sam Hargreaves, Adam Papalia and one more. Eddie McGuire and Brenton Speed can only call a small number of matches due to other commitments, so Sam Hargraves will used for games in QLD, while Leigh Montagna is still learning the craft of play by play.
Yeah funny how a guy retiring suddenly sends this place into a frenzy of “ah, they’ll use this guy, they’ll use that guy” when reality is more than likely so much different.
I imagine they’ll continue using 4 person comm teams for most games. Given they cover 121 matches and Hudson/Russell call around 70 of those but not together I don’t see the need for a new caller. Papalia will do his one a week, as will Ed (be interesting to see if he works in a 4 person or 5 person team), Speedy will do his 15ish Saturday games (as you said)
I think that was a studio call except for Tania Armstrong at the ground. Underwood was also calling but she would never have made it back to Melbourne in time for offsiders the next morning. Expect similar coverage for a lot of the JLT games in the next fortnight, where you’ll know it’s a student call if the boundary rider is delayed in his/her summaries.
Fox Footy is launching a new public competition with the winner to call the Geelong v Essendon pre-season match at GMHBA Stadium on March 7 alongside Kelli Underwood, Dwayne Russell, Paul Roos, Brad Johnson and Cameron Mooney.
Truth be told you’d probably NOT want to win to have to be stuck between a couple of annoying commentators in Kelli and Dwayne, and Roos’ constant negativity…
The winner of So You Think You Can Commentate competition was revealed this afternoon: 15-year-old Fletcher Fraser from Blackburn South in Victoria.
He joined the Fox Footy commentary team this evening and called the early part of the 3rd quarter of Geelong v Essendon match. The highlights can be seen at the AFL website.
Herald Sun today revealed some changes to the Fox Footy line-up this year. Collingwood’s Adam Treloar will join Richmond star Jack Riewoldt and Melbourne veteran Jordan Lewis on AFL 360 on Tuesday nights beginning next week. Riewoldt will join the Fox Footy commentary team calling matches while Lewis will also feature more in match day broadcasts.
Terrific debut? I thought it was a crap effort tbh. He ended up stumbling various times while commentating and acting like a normal goal from set shot was a ripper goal???
Also at one point I heard him call the player 22 and then stumbled again…