The Stadium Announcer in Croke Park

Having recently attended the Ireland - France World Cup play-off in Croke Park (I'll not get into the whole handball thing) I felt it was of the utmost importance that I draw everyone's attention to the disgrace that is the stadium announcer in Croke Park.

What were the powers that be thinking when they put this moron in charge of announcements. Surely the main criteria you look for when hiring a stadium announcer is a voice which people enjoy listening to. Not only does this man not have such a voice, but he probably has THE most annoying voice in Ireland. If not in the whole world. The man sounds like his voice is just breaking and one wonders if perhaps someone is torturing him while he tries to speak. And maybe they should be...

Not only do I take issue with his voice, but also with his idiotic ramblings. "Let's hear it for the boys in Green". That's one of his gems. I mean seriously, did this guy go to university to study stadium announcement because I don't how anyone would be able to come up something so unique and inspiring as that without some sort of formal education? He also asked the crowd to give a warm welcome to the French team. Yea that's a good idea. Let's make sure our arch-nemeses feel right at home so they can crush our world cup dream. In fact, why don't we just cheer for them instead? And then, the coup-de-gras, the most infuriating thing he did all night, came just after Anelka had scored the only goal of the game. The crowd were silent, our chances of qualifying hung in the balance. It was a sickening blow. Up pops our beloved stadium announcer with a rousing consolation: "Our attendance today is 67000, congratulate yourselves on a tremendous turn-out". Yea cheers for that...

For anyone who has never heard him he sounds remarkably like Fr Austin Purcell, "the most boring priest in the world", from Fr Ted. The entire population of a village in Nigeria once sailed to their deaths on a crocodile-infested lake to escape him. He talks constantly an annoying high-pitched voice about the most trivial and irritating topics, including central heating and "favourite humming noises". When he was talking to Fr Jack, Ted had to stop him punching Father Austin. After Ted allows Father Jack to leave he cries out 'Thank Christ' and promptly locks Ted in instead. He also claimed to have known a woman once - "but she died soon afterward". In my humble opinion, I think the writer of Fr Ted may have heard the stadium announcer in question before they wrote Fr Austin's character. If I had to listen to the man for longer than 90 minutes I would consider escaping across a crocodile-infested lake. And I wonder is there a woman in his life, a Mrs. Stadium announcer? Well if there was she may well have died soon afterward. Bored to death no doubt. Frankly, I would much rather have a conversation regarding central heating and my favourite humming noise than listen to him.

If you thought, he couldn't be anymore annoying...you'd be wrong. The music he chooses to play before the game and at half time would be more at home in a teenage disco. Who wants to hear the Black Eyed Peas just before a crucial World Cup Play-off? Anybody? Just the stadium announcer then. Where was 'Brewing Up A Storm', 'Fields Of Athenry', and other such rousing Irish classics? When he finally played 'Put 'Em Under Pressure' it was just before kick-off and he had to cut it short. How's that for professionalism? Not only did he play the most boring and childish songs from the charts, but he also made sure to play a few french pop songs so our visitors wouldn't feel left out. That was a nice touch because in the end they didn't have much to cheer about.

I'm led to believe this guy also gets to be the stadium announcer for rugby games and down the road at the RDS. Apparently not being able to pronounce complicated foreign names and mixing up Leinstr and Ireland are not the criteria looked for when hiring a stadium announcer. He must have some connections somewhere. I think it's time for them to be severed, however. Unfortunately I very much doubt this will happen and my only hope for the future is that he doesn't get the job when the Aviva Stadium on Lansdowne Road opens...fingers crossed.