Mícheál O Muircheartaigh - A master retires

HE may be the most imitated sports commentator of our time but he will never be surpassed.

Mícheál O Muircheartaigh yesterday, 60 years after he first broadcast for RTÉ, announced the end of a career that may never be equalled. A few great sports commentators come to epitomise their sport and their time and O Muircheartaigh has been the voice of the GAA for some decades now. His easy wit, interest in the minutae of players’ lives and his effortless but passionate descriptions of the games he described have earned him a permanent place in our culture.

Could this be because, like that other great commentator of his generation, Scotland’s Bill McLaren, he used his eloquence and erudition to celebrate community through sport?