Colin Sheridan: Michael Lyster did not just present Gaelic Games, he framed them

In a sporting landscape that has grown louder, faster and more performative, Lyster’s approach feels almost from another age.

The Sunday Game presenter Michael Lyster in 2015 Pic: Brendan Moran / SPORTSFILE

There was something eerily profound, on the busiest Sunday of Gaelic Games so far this year, when every second county ground was alive with the first real pulse of spring, that news broke of the passing of veteran broadcaster Michael Lyster. It came just as the final round of the National League was getting underway - the kind of afternoon that felt tailor-made for him, the kind he had presided over for decades with a quiet, unshakeable authority.

For so many, Lyster was not just a presenter but a constant. A steward of the games. On days like this, when fixtures overlapped and storylines collided, he held more sway over his nationwide congregation than most parish priests. The ritual was familiar: the theme music, the panel assembled, the sense that whatever chaos might unfold on the pitch, there would be order in the studio. He was the anchor in every sense of the word.