This Is Your Life: John Motson

John MOTSON (1945-2023)

THIS IS YOUR LIFE - John Motson, football commentator, was surprised by Michael Aspel during the presentation of a cheque for the NCH Action for Children charity at the Bayswater Families Centre in London.

John, who was born in Salford but grew up in London, began his journalistic career in 1963 as a junior reporter with the Barnet Press before moving to the Morning Telegraph in Sheffield, where he first started presenting reports for local radio. He moved back to London in 1968 when the BBC hired him as a sports presenter on Radio 2. In October 1971, he was seconded to BBC television for a year's trial, becoming the youngest member of the Match of the Day reporting team at the age of 26.

Having made his first live commentary with the 1977 FA Cup final, John became the dominant football commentary figure at the BBC, commentating on over 1500 football matches on television and radio, including several World Cups and European Championships. In addition to the Big Red Book, John was also presented with the Carling No. 1 Award - from the then sponsors of the Premiership - an outstanding contribution award for 25 years service to football.

"Oh I don't believe it – my goodness me! Thank you very much! Very unexpected!"

programme details...

Edition No: 952
Subject No: 927
Broadcast date: Fri 18 Oct 1996
Broadcast time: 8.00-8.30pm
Recorded: Mon 30 Sep 1996
Venue: Teddington Studios
Series: 37
Edition: 5
Code name: Match

on the guest list...

Jimmy Hill
Trevor Brooking
Garth Crooks
Gerald Sinstadt
Barry Davies
Bob Wilson
Jim Rosenthal
Graham Kelly
Tom McNab
Tom Watt
Annie - wife
Gary Lineker
Enid Harrison - aunt
Barry Hart
Derek Ufton
Roy Bentley
Freddie - son
Gary Newbon
Roger Jones
Jonathan Lang
Bill Field
Bill Hamilton
Ricky George
Tommy Docherty
Frank Skinner
David Baddiel
Ronnie Radford
Rory Bremner
Desmond Lynam

production team...

Researcher: Jo Grant
Writer: Joe Steeples
Directors: Terry Kinane, Paul Kirrage
Associate Producer: Sue Green
Executive Producer: John Longley
Producer: John Graham

names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life

related pages...

Match of the Day

tackling football's top names

The Theatre of Dreams

Manchester United's finest

Ratings slump sounds death knell for This Is Your Life

Press speculation on the future of This Is Your Life

Bob Wilson

Screenshots of John Motson This Is Your Life

John Motson recalls his experience of This Is Your Life in his autobiography, Motty, reproduced here with kind permission of the author...

...even while I was being whisked away to Thames Television studios in Teddington, I still did not believe this was a real This Is Your Life. They kept me in a room on my own well beyond the time the programme should have started. I wasn't to know that the audience was in place, but Jimmy Hill was late arriving at the studio.

Others who have been the subject of the programme will know my sense of shock when the studio doors opened, and I saw a vast collection of family and friends applauding from all sides. Gradually I started to piece it together as I squinted into the studio lights. My wife Annie in the front row with my cousin Jane and two aunties, Mary and Enid from Boston (how the hell did they get here? I wondered) and colleagues from my newspaper days, as well as an array of BBC types.

Before you get a chance to gather your thoughts, the surprise guests are tumbling on to the stage. The fourteen Roving Reporters players had been brought to the studio in an old coach from the centre of Bayswater. Two of the first guests to be announced were Derek Ufton and Roy Bentley, who had played for Charlton and Chelsea respectively in the first league match I saw – as a six-year-old – at The Valley in 1952.

Then my ten-year-old son, Fred, came on in his Derby County kit. Gary Lineker and my old school friend Gary Newbon were next up.

My former flatmate Bill Hamilton came on to recount stories of us playing Subbuteo until three in the morning, and me commentating! This was back in the days when we shared a flat in North Finchley. The table was spread out in the dining room, and we used to solemnly play a cup competition between all the clubs in England and Scotland.

Talking of Scots, I was particularly delighted to see Tommy Docherty, manager of Manchester United in my first Cup Final. Then came the final moment of an unforgettable night.

The Hereford duo Ronnie Radford and Ricky George appeared to present me with a Carling No. 1 Award from the then sponsors of the Premiership, which was only four years old. Altogether there must have been sixty or seventy people in the audience who had touched my life in some way. It made for a terrific party after the show. Even Michael Aspel stayed for ages, which producers told me was very rare.

Besides being a humbling experience, it was an insight into how television worked outside the sports sector. The amount of effort that went into one episode of This is Your Life left me gasping, particularly as the producers reserved the right to scrap the programme if anybody blew the secret to the recipient.

I can reveal years later that it nearly happened to me. Just a few days before Aspel shoved his red book in my direction, David Pleat had come up to me at a function and said, 'Sorry I can't come to your whats-a-thing.' Fortunately I never attached any importance to it at the time.

The red book originally contained the script from which Aspel was working. At the end of the night he presented it to me with a selection of photographs taken during the evening. A wonderful souvenir.

Series 37 subjects