World Cup: The Commentators' View Special 2.0

16:03Ali Bruce-Ball:I mean, again, we were in a bar watching that and the reaction that got in the bar we were in in Philadelphia is the sort of biggest explosion of joy, noise, of any interaction I've seen at this World Cup in bars or restaurants. You know, we've been talking all this tournament about how engaged people are. That goal, apart from the Argentina fans where we were in the bar in Philadelphia, it just went berserk. It was brilliant. It showed you that the World Cup was grabbing people over here. with and it has it's been a great football wise it's been a really good tournament hasn't it yeah

16:41Ian Dennis:yeah most of the matches i think have been pretty good and some of them have been excellent and i

16:49John Murray:think there have been very few switzerland columbias i was fortunate that due to travel i managed to miss most of switzerland columbia and i need to go back and watch it because i'm actually doing Switzerland against Argentina and I've had a rerun of the second half of that game that you did John which by the way that wasn't too shabby either in Atlanta Argentina Argentina

17:14Ian Dennis:Egypt yeah no necessarily needed that two days after Mexico England in all honesty I suspect you

17:19Ali Bruce-Ball:didn't but it's quite do you know what I mean this is a slightly different point going off on a tangent I was just thinking you know Cape Verde had been a brilliant story at this World Cup and they pushed Argentina really close and so did Egypt we're about to do France Morocco in Boston and actually in I was just doing the stats on it in knockout games at the World Cup if you look at African nations against European nations there have been 18 games and the European nations as you'd expect you know because the African nations have obviously got stronger and stronger but the European nations dominated but Morocco have three of the four African wins they're the one African team that's been able to get to a position like Egypt did against Argentina or KB, but actually see it through and go a little bit further.

18:06Ali Bruce-Ball:And I think France will probably be, possibly be beyond them. I think it's really encouraging, isn't it, to see how well the African nations, particularly at this World Cup, have performed. I mean, nine out of 10 of them made it through, didn't they, into that last 32. And some of the performances have been superb.

18:21Ian Dennis:Yeah, but then fell pretty quickly and um i think that i think that morocco are quite an inspiration you know they're setting the they're setting the standard because as we were saying yesterday during the commentary really egypt's world cup record is terrible it should be much much better than that than it is and you know they almost produced the greatest result that they've ever had at the world cup but you know I think I think it's a bit like you know Ali the golf that we watch when you get like the masters you know when when the European players broke through at the masters you know others follow and I suspect you know Morocco are capable of winning this World Cup and if that happens then I'm sure that you would then see an improvement in the record of many of the African teams.

19:12Ali Bruce-Ball:Yeah, and also in that, that's a really good, I mean, France are obviously the strong favourites, but were Morocco to knock them out, this competition is wide open, isn't it, in terms of all the other teams. I think anyone else in there could beat anyone. I still think France are strong favourites, but were Morocco to beat them, wow.

19:28John Murray:Well, I started the tournament thinking France were the favourites, but then I've seen Spain, and I think Spain play with a greater control and restrict their opposition to fewer opportunities, and I think you can get at the French defence. I know the front four are frightening, but I think that opening game against Senegal, Senegal should have been won, 2-0 up at half-time. Jackson hits the post. Sar squanders a great opportunity, close range. The Norwegian second team in Boston had opportunities in the first half against France. So I think once you get past that front four and you can get to the French defence, and I think Sabah is missing, isn't he, for Morocco?

20:03Ali Bruce-Ball:Likely to be, very likely to be, yeah.

20:05John Murray:Which is a shame, because I think he's one of their better players, and that's a blow. But I still think that they've got the potential to hurt France. But then coming into the semi-final, if Spain obviously do get through to the last four, Spain are formidable because they do restrict the opportunities. I mean, Austria didn't have a shot on target, despite, with their approach, playing okay. And then they kept Portugal, who were very, very tame, at an arm's length as well. So I think that it would be a repeat of the semi-final too, wouldn't it, of the Euros in Germany? in Munich when La Minha Mal scored that terrific curling effort and where they won by two goals to one.

20:47John Murray:So if it was to be Spain-France, I'd be backing the Spanish.

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22:02John Murray:I'm Steve Bratnell, host of Games Gone, the Steve Bratnell podcast. What's my favourite World Cup moment as a fan? I have to say, Michael Owen skinning the hole of the Argentina defence and cracking it in top corner for a very short space of time, I believe. It's an absolutely fantastic goal by Michael Owen! My favourite World Cup player in history. It won't be popular, but I'm going to say Diego Maradona. All right, he handballed it. But the guy was a complete genius. The People World Cup 2026. Listen on BBC Sounds. The commentator's view at the People World Cup 2026. On the Football Daily Podcast.

22:45Listen on BBC Sounds.

22:49Ali Bruce-Ball:TCV at bbc.co.uk. The number's 08000 289 369. just to rattle through some of the correspondence actually I also forgot we had some lovely ones off the back of the England-Mexico game Peter from Dublin's got in touch and said hi all, hats off to John for his outstanding commentary on that Mexico game absolutely brilliant Joseph says take a bow John Murray and Paul Robinson watch the game on iPlayer with five live commentary as the skies began to brighten get yourselves in a hyperbaric chamber after that Rob from Linfield says is someone old enough to have watched every World Cup since 1966. This performance, more than any other, sums up what it means to be an England football fan.

23:29Ali Bruce-Ball:Magnificent. A masterclass in tactics, preparation and match management. Thomas Tuchel take a bow. This is the way we want to win or lose it. So thank you very much for all of those. Moving on, Louis in Whitney, Oxfordshire, has a question for us here. Dear TCV, hoping there's another World Cup pod. Yes, this is it. really enjoying the radio commentary especially with the synced up pictures. I know you've covered commentary microphones in a previous edition of TCV but I noticed in a BBC social media post that the Paraguayan commentators use a microphone more commonly used or seen in interviews.

24:06Ali Bruce-Ball:I've also seen this a lot from Spanish radio commentary teams. Is that just a preference? Is there a reason why they do it that way? Judging from the Paraguayan commentary there didn't seem to be any noticeable difference in quality keep up the great work. So here's how it sounded on Five Live when Ian pointed his microphone in the direction of the of the Paraguayan commentary team.

24:28John Murray:What we're going to do on the half-time whistle we're going to try and give you a little flavour and you can listen to La Tribuna the national radio of Paraguay as Kimmich with a cross cleared well by Gustavo Gomez so here is half-time whistle and this is this is La Tribuna

25:01John Murray:he's given us the thumbs up either that who was telling us to get out and that's what he's been like consistently since he scored the goal when he scored the goal it was a different scale altogether.

25:12Ian Dennis:That was great, wasn't it? I had not heard that. It sounded like he said in the midst of that commentary, Golden Seesaw. Could that be a non-intended pub name, the Golden Seesaw?

25:24Ali Bruce-Ball:Yeah, I sent you a picture. I walked past the last hurrah today, which I thought that's that, you know, you must have used that in a commentary somewhere before the last hurrah is a good name. But John, we've got an expert who can actually answer this question, haven't we? Absolutely. Sitting right beside you, yeah.

25:39Ian Dennis:We absolutely have. And by the way, I must say thank you very much to Peter from Dublin and Joseph for their comments. But we have sitting here special guest appearance from Rob Dybal, who is, what do we call you, Rob? Senior outside broadcast engineer. Yeah, that I do. Yeah. And just to explain to the listeners, it's Rob who engineers certainly the England matches and the other ones that we've done as well. So, you know, we've been asked on this podcast, Rob, a lot about lip mics that we're using now, as opposed to open mics, which have been used by the Paraguayans. So explain it all. So we use these lip mics, which are called Coles, were made by a company called Coles, and they're designed to keep the effects away from it, so we've got more control.

26:27So they're designed for use in noisy environments, and that's why you speak so closely when it's touching your lip hence the name lip mics yeah and that enables us to be able to add in effects that we'd like to put in as opposed to the open mics which we just heard from the Paraguayans they don't obviously add effects I wouldn't have thought because you can pick it up on their mics because they're more open so we'll also have a

26:53Ian Dennis:microphone set out which or microphones you tell me yeah yeah well here we we put out an effects mic just for us but we also have a um a feed of the rifle mics that are down on pit side and they are and they are long those long yeah that footballers keep kicking that's the ones um yeah so if you look at the next time you watch uh there's normally one pointing towards the corner flag yeah they look like sausages yeah sir yeah furry furry sausages very soon yeah um

27:22Ali Bruce-Ball:Rob, who else across the world uses lit mics? Are the BBC the only people? Yeah, I think it is. I've never ever seen anyone else apart from British people. And other broadcasters are fascinated by them, aren't they? Yeah, absolutely. They look at us like, yeah. I mean, and what we do as the engineers, we normally, I mean, I'm doing it wrong. I'm doing it correctly now, and it feels really bad because we talk into the back of them because we don't need to talk because you're going to talk in the front, so we talk in the back. so this is quite alien to me actually she's holding it in the correct correct way um but it does mean i mean also going back to the mexico match where i mean did we have four three you know about four people didn't we yes in the build-up and that is a struggle in itself because it doesn't cut out all the ambient noise obviously because it comes in the back as well um so that is a bit of a struggle when you're trying to balance the amount of effects in in the ground.

28:18Ali Bruce-Ball:That's another one isn't it that our listeners might not know but quite often, so let's say a game is being presented from not inside the stadium, a producer will often say to us mics live so we're not talking but our mics are up because they want that stadium absolutely but it's also a warning to us is that we can't you know you're well whenever you're near a microphone we know that rule as in you you've got to think that you're on air but we're not meant to speak but we're just being told that our mics are live. Yeah, I mean, when we have the effects, and during the tournament you've had the effects as well, I think the mics live means the line is up, not necessarily the mics are up, because we could fade your mics down, obviously, and we've got effects that we put in.

29:01But obviously they are being used to mask if a presenter is not in the stadium.

29:05Ian Dennis:There are several things about using the lip mics that I love. The fact that they look so old-fashioned, the fact that probably this is how they've always been used you know probably Raymond Glendening was commentating with a lit mic and also I like the sound quality I think you can really tell the difference and and and also from a broadcaster's point of view I like the idea that you have to pick up the microphone and put it next to your mouth to broadcast and it feels like when you do that it feels like right I'm on now I've got a question for Rob as well which I think people will be interested in, which reflects the perils of being an outside broadcast engineer at this World Cup.

29:48Ian Dennis:And that is the fact that we've got soaked in Boston and New Jersey and in the Azteca. Yeah, for different reasons. So it's a bit annoying, really, but the commentary points in Boston and New York, that's the two that we've been to, which are outside. There's no roof at all, so we have no cover. And Ali, you were saying earlier about wandering around Boston in the lovely weather. Well, it was lovely when we left New York and then it started raining and then it rained until we got back in the car and drove back. So we saw Boston, it was torrential rain all the time. Myself and Paul Robinson, we got out of the car and thought, we've under-clubbed on our clothes here.

30:26We're sitting here in shorts and T-shirts. But the problem there was we had literally no cover at all. So I did pare it back a lot for the two matches. the host broadcasters supplied heavy-duty plastic covers really but we managed to get through it

30:39Ian Dennis:and in the azteca when when mexico scored their goals it rained tequila and beer on us which i know ian is something that uh i know some people who would actually have put just opened their mouth but that was also that was also an issue with the equipment yeah it was in fact um declan from Talk Sport, a glass of, I guess, beer landed on his... On his MacBook. On his MacBook. Which apparently completely ruined it. Ruined it. Yeah. When we picked up the passes from the broadcast office the day before, they said, oh, we've moved you down a bit because of Beer Alley. And we had been warned about this.

31:18But when the first goal, when Mexico scored the first goal, we were just showered. It was a shower.

31:23Ian Dennis:Yeah. And I think it was tequila that landed on me.

31:25John Murray:I think it was. Yeah. And Paul's book. Beer Alley has got nothing to do with Ali Bruce Ball. No. And secondly, John, I know that you've got many things. I would never, ever, and I would never advocate anybody to open their mouth in the hope of trying to get some beer or tequila that he's thrown, because I know what football fans also do if they're caught short with their glasses.

31:49Ian Dennis:Well, there's very good advice for our younger listeners on this podcast, and I know we have many, so listen to Uncle Ian. Shall we say thank you very much to Rob for his contribution? Yeah, Rob. Tremendous. Which we've been meaning to do that, haven't we? To get one of our excellent engineers on for quite a long time. So we've done that and we might do that again. I really know. Thank you very much. Yeah, thank you. Thank you.

32:11Ali Bruce-Ball:Let's move on to unintended pub names. This is where you can get in touch with us, tcv at bbc.co.uk, if you hear an unintended pub name in any of our sports commentaries. So I've mentioned The Last Hurrah, which is a genuine pub here in Boston I've walked past. I've also been in the Dig In, which I really liked in Philadelphia, which is a good, good pub name. Samuel's got in touch, says, Hi TCV, I've got an unintended pub name. This is from the early stages of Norway against Ivory Coast, and it was said by Chris Sutton, who was on commentary with Ali. Pepe on the ball again, down by the dead ball line, onto his left foot.

32:44Ali Bruce-Ball:Low cross comes in and a stretching leg from Heggen blocks that Ivory Coast win themselves. A corner, nil-nil. You have that long left leg of Hegem. And the near post space gets down and pops it behind. So the long left leg, says Samuel, would be a curious establishment on a Caribbean island, a supposed former pirate's bolt hole. It would be wooden by the beach and shaded by very old palm trees. The interior would be old dry wood and on display in a case on the wall would be the preserved leg of a pirate dug up from the foundations of the building. And in the evening, the porch would be full of tourists watching the sunset.

33:24Ian Dennis:That has immediately made me think of when we were in Fort Worth, we went to a place called the Stockyards, which is like a sort of where they run the cattle. You can go and see the longhorns, the Texas longhorns. They run them in the street during the course of the day. And there's also some very odd shops there. and one of them sells bison's heads. Bison's heads, which retail at$9 ,000. So if anyone's listening to the commentator's view and you're thinking, where can I get a bison's head? That's where. Stockyards, Fort Worth, but you'll need$9 ,000. And also, you can actually get the rear end of a bison as well, if you prefer that.

34:06Ian Dennis:This is to put on the wall.

34:07John Murray:£9 ,000 and then$50 for excess baggage.

34:11Ali Bruce-Ball:And the rest. Anything to declare, sir?

34:14Ian Dennis:Yes, a Dyson's head.

34:15Ali Bruce-Ball:The number to get in touch as well is 08000 289 369. You can leave voice notes via that number like Lara. Hiya, gents. It's Lara from Merseyside here. Hope you're all well and enjoying your World Cup experiences. I've really been enjoying the option to have your commentary playing alongside the TV coverage on the iPlayer. And I did this for the Germany versus Paraguay game.

34:37John Murray:Rudiger delivers the cross. Good header out, though. that was from Bakubas who climbed high. The little warrior in the midfield there for Paraguay. Surely the little warrior is an old-fashioned stone wall pub. It'd have very low beamed ceilings and an open fire. Comfy seating and some random bits of armour and weaponry scattered around the place. At the end of the bar in Pride of Place they'd have a full suit of armour designed for a somewhat vertically challenged night. Anyway I'm loving the pod and looking forward to Clash of the commentators returning for a bit more controversy. Justice for John.

35:10John Murray:Oh, Laura, you were going so well. You've just got to let yourself down. Well done, Laura.

35:15Ian Dennis:Well done, Laura. And also, I think the Little Warrior could be a nice red wine, couldn't it? Like a glass of the Little Warrior. Jed in Geelong. I think we've heard from Jed before, haven't we? I think, possibly. Anyway, if not, welcome, Jed. He says, Perhaps the most ubiquitous unintended pub name in the FIFA World Cup to date has been the hydration break. I see it, says Jed, as an American brand and apart from a few forays into Canada and Mexico, has been largely ignored in the rest of the world. Controversially, they don't serve pints or halves, only quarters. And despite being advertised as a sports-themed bar, their wall-mounted TVs don't actually show any sport whatsoever, only adverts for beers, sodas, fast food brands, snacks and BPH treatments.

36:06Ian Dennis:Opinion is divided as to whether the hydration break is worth frequenting. That would be many in the USA, brackets. Or if it should be consigned to the bottle bin of history, given it's just an excuse for a cash grab by FIFA, says Jed, brackets. That would be the rest of the world, brackets. However, FIFA will no doubt lord the hydration break as an unqualified success, given the large amount of booze. Sorry, I mean booze. It generates every game. Cheers, Jed in Geelong. that's very well written Jed. Very good.

36:43John Murray:And I have to say Jed I will never ever be seen in the hydration break.

36:48Ali Bruce-Ball:The one thing I would say to that Paraguay France in Philadelphia on Independence Day it was over a hundred degrees and it must have been even hotter down by the pitch so there I forgave it. Well that's when it should that's when you should have them but this this argument well

37:04Ian Dennis:well, it has to be consistent across all the matches. No, it doesn't. It just has to be consistent within a match so that both coaches get the same opportunity.

37:13John Murray:And proof of that, it wasn't consistent in the second half of France, Iraq and Philadelphia because of the rain delay. They wanted to get the game finished. So they actually said when the second half eventually started after a two hour delay, there will be no drinks break in the second half. So where was the consistency there?

37:28Ali Bruce-Ball:Portsmouth fan Bruce in sunny Southsea has written in. This is about syncing up the live radio commentary with the television pictures, which you've been able to do for BBC Games via the iPlayer. I think lots of people have enjoyed this feature during the tournament. So Bruce says, good name, Bruce. There are two types of tournament viewers. The few enthusiasts of the beautiful game who prefer to enjoy the poetic, descriptive prose of Five Lives commentators and those who will blissfully sit through other broadcast offerings. If there's been one beneficial new addition to this World Cup, it is that the multi-screen kickoff countdown has made it perfectly straightforward to sync the five live commentary over a muted broadcast i've got friends stateside who switched to watching spanish streams in order to avoid the u.s commentary and the hydration break commercials they've now adopted this same approach and they are five live disciples nothing comes close thank you bruce oh no thank you and bruce but i'm going to say thank you bruce and also james and

38:27Ian Dennis:Fran the dog in West Bridgeford, lovely, lovely West Bridgeford, says a particular hack that I like for international matches only is to use a specific sound or word in the anthem as a hook to sync it all up. He says, I usually do this for my beloved Wales. Sad to have missed out on a trip to Seattle, brackets. But using England as an example, I would pause the earlier feed on the word God or King and then repeat on the other device and that syncs it up the logic here says James is that the anthems are the only consistent sound on both Eads and he says love the podcast so thank you James and I think that will help people before we go John two things both coming

39:12Ali Bruce-Ball:from you one is this case of mistaken identity and it also says here we need to mention Malcolm

39:18Ian Dennis:right yes i will do that to finish on but one on one of our days traveling uh i was wearing a blue polo shirt plain blue polo shirt which is exactly the same color as the people who work for united airlines and and in the airport because it was it was a really busy day that day that there was this big set of doors that you had to go through i think to connect to other flights but it said on the door it said on the door do not do not go through these doors unless you are connecting to another flight so i was standing on my own thing and one person comes up and says um can you tell me how to get to the connecting flight and i said oh yeah i think it's just through the door two minutes later somebody excuse me can you tell me how to get to the connecting flight so i go through these doors and i said um yeah you just go through these doors it's full of like and the Two minutes later, someone, excuse me, can you tell me how to get to connecting flights?

40:19Ian Dennis:They go through these doors. And then by this stage, I've already done it twice, and there's someone there. And I said, well, you can go through, but I'll keep the door open while you go and ask them if you can go through. And then somebody else comes over and asks me the same question. There must have been 10 people asked me how to get to connecting flights because I'm wearing this shirt. Did you ask for a tip? I should have done. I should have done. And I also met a very nice couple from York there as well, who I had a chat with. But anyway, I just want to mention Malcolm Wright, who is a really inspirational figure for me in my career.

40:55Ian Dennis:And, you know, I might not have actually ended up doing this job had it not been for Malcolm. And very sadly, I found out on the very eve of coming here to this World Cup that he had sadly died in the weeks before the World Cup. and he had a memorial service in Darlington that I would have loved to have gone to because, as I say, he was such an important figure in my career because when I finished university and then did a postgraduate degree in radio journalism, as you two I'm sure remember at the time, there were only probably, I don't know, six or eight colleges that did that in the country and I got turned down flat by five of them or six of them, however many it was.

41:42Ian Dennis:And Darlington College of Technology was my final chance. And many of these courses had done long, drawn-out processes, full days interviews. You had to get through this. Then there was another interview and I failed them all. I went to Darlington and with Malcolm, it was like a sit-down chat. And after about three minutes, Malcolm said, yep you're on the course and uh you know from that my career developed and you know stayed in touch with malcolm he was a great guy and a real old-fashioned proper investigative journalist as well and he went on to work for itv as well i know he has he has so many friends back in the uk and all of us who are on our course uh will miss him terribly so i just want to mention him here and uh you know pass on my thoughts to his friends and family and say sorry i wasn't able to get to what sounded like an amazing memorial event as well.

42:35Ian Dennis:So there we are, Malcolm Wright.

42:37Ali Bruce-Ball:Yeah, well said, John. It's true as well, isn't it? I think back to those days of doing the post-grad broadcast journalism degree and then starting in local radio, never ever imagining that you'd end up commentating at a World Cup in Russia or the USA. You do pinch yourself, don't you? We are incredibly lucky to do it. And the other thing as well,

43:04Ian Dennis:and it is relevant as well because Malcolm was, you know, he was a very loyal listener to what we do, our football coverage, our sports coverage. So he was a big fan of Five Live and Five Live Sports as well.

43:17Ali Bruce-Ball:Right, I think that's it for this episode. The thing I meant to ask actually, because I've handed Chris Sutton on to you, like, so I spent about, you know, two and a half weeks with Chris. Is he behaving himself? Is he okay?

43:27John Murray:No, he's not behaving. And when you said earlier that you sat in the back, wherever it was, well, he's told tales about you and your producer, John Southall, about driving him down the wrong side of the road.

43:37Ali Bruce-Ball:Yeah, we both did actually do that, accidentally, obviously.

43:41Ian Dennis:Whenever I have anyone in the car, if I'm driving, who comes out with that sort of thing, I always say, do you want me to stop and let you have a go?

43:47John Murray:Yeah, well, I mean, there is a tale to tell, isn't there, about that from Qatar in 2022, but maybe now it's not the time. but he hasn't changed his backseat driving manner. It's back at all. Yeah. Is he still wearing the Stetson? Yes, he is. And he also, he's very critical of you though, Ali, because he said that you didn't pay for that. He said that he forked out a lot of money and he said that Bruce wasn't forthcoming with any cash towards it.

44:21Ali Bruce-Ball:I love my one, although Chapa said my one is more man from Del Monte than an actual Stetson and I did offer Chris money for it no don't worry Bruce it'll be fine so that's what he does he says no it's a gift you have it lovely and then on air he says Bruce has never has never you know has never offered me a thing for that so you you know the game he's playing there yeah well I know

44:38John Murray:that you two spent a lot of time um listen I'm not telling tales out of school I wouldn't do that but you spent a lot of time creating films for social media and the word is is that you are not happy with the two of us because we didn't partake. Now, I had an excuse. I had a genuine excuse because I was in the middle of doing two games in two days. But word has reached me that John did everything to sort of like manoeuvre out of not doing it. That's not true. That's not true. I was very keen to do it. But you didn't do it, did you?

45:10Ian Dennis:No, I know. But I had a great idea to do it as well. But then we just didn't have time. We just didn't have time. But I've said to Ali, the one I want to see you do, Ali, is I want to see you do the starsky and hutch one i think that would be brilliant that would be really have you got

45:25Ali Bruce-Ball:time to do that well the only problem with that is i think because i'm now with pat you can't have two starskis you need we need a i think chris is hutch and and i'm starsky also john you you were going to be our jr that's that's why we were that's why we were so disappointed there because we we'd specifically save that role for you yeah honestly he's a stirrer chris is terrible he is Naughty. Very naughty.

45:49John Murray:I did come up with an idea when we were in Kansas that he should don a pair of red stilettos like Dorothy and click his heels together. And I did say that I'd be the lion. I said, if you get me like a lion's outfit, I'd go, put him up, put him up.

46:10Ian Dennis:Anyway, I'd be the tin man, of course. Heartless. That leaves you as the straw man. Well, that's you. Yes. That's you. Unless you want to play the role of Dorothy, Ali.

46:22Ali Bruce-Ball:No, no.

46:23John Murray:But what was the scarecrow? Oh, well, actually, on current form, if it's true what Chris is saying about you, you'd actually be the Wicked Witch of the West.

46:31Ali Bruce-Ball:Ah, yeah. Hang on, but what was... Sorry, I've completely forgot my wizard. What was the scarecrow lacking? Was it... So the Tin Man didn't have a heart, the Lion didn't have courage. Was it... What was the scarecrow? Was it Brains? No.

46:44Ian Dennis:Yeah, I think it was Brains. Yes, it was. Yeah, so... No offence.

46:49Ali Bruce-Ball:Exactly. Lovely. Nice to see you, chaps. Good luck. Good luck with the rest of your travels. Good luck with your quarterfinals. Likewise. Yes, thank you very much. That is it for this episode of The Commentator's View. Questions and correspondence, always welcome to tcv at bbc.co.uk and you can send us a message or a voice note on WhatsApp to 08000 289 369. The next episode of the Football Daily will be Rick and Lloyd's World Cup diary from Santa Monica as we take you closer to all the big talking points at World Cup 2026.

47:27Ian Dennis:A couple have just started playing tennis on the top of the building opposite me.

47:31Ali Bruce-Ball:Right, OK.

47:31Ian Dennis:Fancy that.

47:32Ali Bruce-Ball:Is there a net there? Is there a court or are they just playing tennis? Yeah, well, there's a court and a net, yes.

47:36Ian Dennis:You do tend to need that for tennis and they've got it. so much sport today and all the goals as they go in up and down the league this is five life sports it's all eyes to the lights and foot to the floor it's not his stop out everyone's standing around the 18th green he shows to the center Oh, the right hand and former champion is down.

48:04John Murray:It's extraordinary stuff. They've done a show for us tonight. He gets on his knees and kisses the turf. Five Live Sports. The home of the world's greatest sporting events. This is the full time window. Listen on BBC Sounds.

48:25The United States is about to mark its 250th anniversary. And so on the Global Story podcast from the BBC, we're telling surprising tales of American influence on the world stage and in ordinary people's lives all across the globe.

48:40Ali Bruce-Ball:We have this ability to export our story and a lot of people have bought it. I feel like the American dream is alive but not well. From the BBC, it's the United States at 2.50. Listen on bbc.com or wherever you get your podcasts.