The Commentators' View: Milner’s landmark & TCV pillow talk
Football Daily
BBC
4.3 • 4.6K Ratings
🗓️ 6 February 2026
⏱️ 56 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
John Murray, Ian Dennis & Ali Bruce-Ball talk football, travel & language. They look ahead to what could be a landmark weekend for James Milner and get correspondence from a couple who listen to TCV in bed. Plus unintended pub and film names, Clash of the Commentators and the Great Glossary of Football Commentary. Suggestions and questions always welcome on WhatsApp voicenotes to 08000 289 369 & emails to TCV@bbc.co.uk
01:10 Private Eye Colemanballs 02:30 John Murray caught in the wild 05:35 Commentaries this weekend 10:10 Owners and fans pulling in different directions? 12:20 James Milner in for landmark weekend? 17:25 TCV pillowtalk 21:15 John’s surprise greeting 24:15 Unintended pub names 29:30 Clash of the Commentators 38:20 Great Glossary of Football Commentary 50:45 How to keep a dead game interesting
5 Live / BBC Sounds commentaries: Sat 1500 Arsenal v Sunderland, Sat 1500 Bournemouth v Villa on Sports Extra, Sat 1730 Newcastle v Brentford, Sun 1400 Brighton v Palace, Sun 1630 Liverpool v Man City.
Great Glossary of Football Commentary: DIVISION ONE 2-0 can be a dangerous score, Agricultural challenge, Back of the net, Back to square one, Bosman, Bullet header, Cruyff Turn, Cultured/educated left foot, Dead-ball specialist, Draught excluder, Elastico/flip-flap, False nine, Fox in the box, Giving the goalkeeper the eyes, Grub hunter, Head tennis, Hibs it, In a good moment, In behind, Magic of the FA Cup, Middle of the park, The Maradona, Off their line, Olimpico, Onion bag, Panenka, Park the bus, Perfect hat-trick, Rabona, Roy of the Rovers stuff, Schmeichel-style, Scorpion kick, Spursy, Stick it in the mixer, Target man, Tiki-taka, Towering header, Trivela, Where the kookaburra sleeps, Where the owl sleeps, Where the spiders sleep.
DIVISION TWO Back on the grass, Ball stays hit, Beaten all ends up, Blaze over the bar, Business end, Came down with snow on it, Catching practice, Camped in the opposition half, Cauldron atmosphere Coat is on a shoogly peg, Come back to haunt them, Corridor of uncertainty, Couldn’t sort their feet out, Easy tap-in, Daisy-cutter, First cab off the rank, Giant-killing, Good leave, Good touch for a big man, Half-turn, Has that in his locker, High wide and not very handsome, Hospital pass, Howler, In the dugout, In their pocket, Johnny on the spot, Leading the line, Leather a shot, Needed no second invitation, Nice headache to have, Nutmeg, On their bike, One for the cameras, One for the purists, Played us off the park, Points to the spot, Prawn sandwich brigade, Purple patch, Put their laces through it, Reaches for their pocket, Rolls Royce, Root and branch review, Row Z, Screamer, Seats on the plane, Show across the bows, Slide-rule pass, Steal a march, Straight in the bread basket, Stramash, Taking one for the team, Telegraphed that pass, Tired legs, That’s great… (football), Thunderous strike, Turns on a sixpence, Walk it in, We’ve got a cup tie on our hands.
UNSORTED After you Claude, All-Premier League affair, Aplomb, Bag/box of tricks, Brace, Brandished, Bread and butter, Breaking the deadlock, Bundled over the line, Champions elect / champions apparent, Clinical finish, Commentator’s curse, Coupon buster, Denied by the woodwork, Draught excluder, Elimination line, Fellow countryman, Foot race, Formerly of this parish, Free hit, Goalkeepers’ Union, Goalmouth scramble, Honeymoon Period, In and around, In the shop window, Keeping ball under their spell, Keystone Cops defending, Languishing, Loitering with intent, Marching orders, Nestle in the bottom corner, Numbered derbies, Opposite number, PK for penalty-kick, Postage stamp, Rasping shot, Red wine not white wine, Relegation six-pointer, Rooted at the bottom, Route One, Sending the goalkeeper the wrong way, Shooting boots, Sleeping giants, Slide rule pass, Small matter of, Spiders web, Stayed hit, Steepling, Stinging the palms, Stonewall penalty, Straight off the training ground, Taking one for the team, Team that likes to play football, Throw their cap on it, Thruppenny bit head / 50p head, Two good feet, Turning into a basketball match, Turning into a cricket score, Usher/Shepherd the ball out of play, Walking a disciplinary tightrope, Wand of a left foot, Wrap foot around it, Your De Bruynes, your Gundogans etc.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:07.2 | This is Radio One's All Day Breakfast with Greg James. |
| 0:12.1 | That sounds awesome. |
| 0:13.3 | Breakfast show highlights with an extra serving of silly stuff. |
| 0:16.6 | I'm going to eat six bags of crisp. |
| 0:18.2 | Hey! |
| 0:19.2 | Featuring the biggest guests on the planet. It's Tyler Swift. I was like we got to call Greg. It's been too long. Joyne the Rob Johnson. What's up, brother? And all the important questions. What's the length of my FEMA? What? Get Greg Energy anytime. With Radio 1's all day breakfast. New episodes, weekdays on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:39.4 | The Commentator's View on the Football Daily with Alistair Bruce Ball, John Murray and Ian Dennis. |
| 0:47.1 | Hello, welcome to the Football Daily. I'm Alistair Bruce Ball and this is the commentators |
| 0:51.9 | view where we five live commentators discuss the football we watch |
| 0:55.2 | the places it takes us to from the moss rose to the marra cana although not been to the maricanar for a while actually |
| 1:00.9 | and the words and phrases we used to describe it all lots of which of course feature in our great glossary |
| 1:07.5 | of football commentary we always need your help with that. So emails to TCV at |
| 1:12.6 | BBC.bc.com.ukau. A busy winter schedule, but no rotation policy for the commentators view this |
| 1:18.7 | week. The BBC's football correspondent, John Murray, is here and the BBC's senior football reporter. |
| 1:23.5 | Ian Dennis is here in the dark this morning for this episode, Ian. Would you care to explain? |
| 1:28.9 | He's got a slight electrical issue. Apart from that, everything is fine. I think John's |
| 1:34.5 | halo will provide the light for this episode. Yeah, just sitting here shining it. |
| 1:42.0 | A couple of parish notices before we start the episode this week. |
| 1:46.1 | John, you mentioned, I think it was in last week's episode, about you, Mark Chapman and |
| 1:50.9 | Paul Robinson, all featuring in commentator balls in Private Eye. |
| 1:56.5 | You've then very kindly posted the excerpt from the magazine in our WhatsApp group, and I thought for the benefit of our listeners, I should read them out. So you're all at the same game here, aren't you? I think we were, yeah. Yeah, this was the Macclesfield Crystal Palace. Was that right? Cup tie. I think so. I think so. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Who shall we start with then? Do we start with John Murray? |
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