Hi, I'm Grant Wall, and welcome to the Planet Football Podcast, where I go in-depth with the most intriguing people in the world of soccer.

On today's show, Ray Hudson joins me for a fun conversation on how he developed his love for words, his unique

broadcasting style, his appreciation for Leonel Massey and Cristiano Ronaldo, his favorite stories from the 1970s NASL, and his love of South American

soccer players.

He also explains why he loves listening to Spanish language soccer broadcasts even though he doesn't know the language.

When I listen to them and their passion and their wonderful descriptives at a speed and in a color even though I don't understand the words

Somehow I get it and I connect with that more and it makes me enjoy the game more somehow.

All that and more coming up.

Joining us today is one of the most distinctive voices in soccer broadcasting.

Ray Hudson can be heard every week calling games on being sports,

and you can also hear him on Sirius XM Satellite Radio.

Ray played for Newcastle United

and the Fort Lauderdale Strikers,

among many other teams.

And he coached the Miami Fusion and DC United

before going into broadcasting and becoming, in my opinion, a national treasure.

Ray, thanks for joining me.

Thanks very much, Grant, for your keen words.

And yeah, it's been a it's been a wilder trip you know ever since I came to the

United States in 1977 landing in Fort Lauderdale Florida on on Spring Break. From then on it's been Space Mountain on steroids.

Ray, there's a Twitter account called Live Ray Hudson that preserves some of your WordSmith work every week for history in real time.

A look at recent games includes these phrases, like smoke through a keyhole, centipedes fantasize

...