Bruce McAvaney

Bruce began his media career in 1978 calling horse races on Adelaide radio station 5DN before moving on to hosting a television sports show in 1978. In 1980 he was chosen to host the Australian end of the broadcast of the Moscow Olympics and has hosted the coverage of every Olympic games since.

Once he (re)joined the seven network in 1989, he took over calling just about every sporting event including the AFL Grand Final, Bathurst 1000 motor race, the Australian Open tennis and the Australian Masters' Golf. He is however best recognised as the face of the Australian Rules football league, having hosted "talking footy" - the most popular football show in the nation perhaps besides "The footy show".

His commentary, however, leaves something to be desired. He often claims to be more knowledgeable than he in fact is on sports he is presenting, epsecially in the Olympic games coverage. Below is a selection of Bruce McAvaney's finest moments:

Sydney 2000 Olympics:

• "There are about 3.7 billion people watching the opening ceremony - that's over three billion."
• (At the start of the sprint) "And they're off to a running start!"
• Bruce declared his love of the name of American swimmer, Misty Hyman live to air.
• "The lactic acid will have precipitated..."
• "She hasn't swum that fast in a long time ... she's smashed her personal best"
• "Let's have a look at the women's snatch" (weightlifting, of course...)
• "Look at Kylie (Minogue) with the big thong..."

AFL:

• "Thumped on cleverly by Rocca. He is a thinking man..."
• "Johnson caresses it to Cox"
• "Ooh it's exciting. It's as exciting as it gets in Adelaide and I should know..."
• "He was outnumered in terms of, er..., numbers"