Aidan Smith: BBC’s Olympics pip MotD for medals, but welcome back football

THE BBC’s coverage of the Olympics is scheduled to end at 11.30pm tonight, which is when the closing credits will start to roll.

It’s fashionable to knock the Beeb over how many staff it deems necessary for big outside broadcasts, and this time there will be speculation that the roll-call will still be going at four in the morning (with no sign at that stage of “Assistant’s assistant (grey shirts) to Mr Lineker”). But, seriously, what colour of medal, if any, would you award the Corporation for London 2012? First, before the great and the good, the not-exactly-brilliant, and we may as well start with Gary Lineker. There was a horrible moment on the very first Saturday when he introduced Alan Hansen and Robbie Savage and they attempted to share memories of Olympics past. I just thought: are these football guys going to be slouched, Match of the Day-style, showing off their football thighs, for the whole fortnight? Thankfully, no. You presumably only saw the others after that if you searched for the Olympic football (I didn’t), but Lineker was a regular anchorman. When you’re not an expert at the sports on show it’s your job to get the best out of those who are, be they pundits or participants. Lineker didn’t really do this. (unlike, say, Clare Balding at poolside). Lineker failed to ask good questions. Football, and football people, didn’t have a great Games – but what dull monomaniac has been yearning for the start of the new season?

Normally I am that dull monomaniac, which is why I can make these comparisons with football. The coverage of these Games has made programmes such as MotD appear lazy and uninformed, although over-reaching is just as bad as being uninformed. A football commentator such as Clive Tyldesley over-reaches all the time: straining for memorable words. You are never in any doubt that Clive Tyldesley is commentating. When Paul Dickenson commentates on track and field you have to check who it is, or at least I did. He doesn’t try to force his personality on you; he just gives you the fascinating facts.

Steve Cram has been excellent, part of the Geordie mafia with Dickenson (no relation to David Dickinson, clearly) and Brendan Foster. A canny accent helps when you’re commentating so I’ve also enjoyed, from the same neck of the woods, Matt Baker at the gymnastics, who quickly fell under the spell, as did your correspondent, of Gabrielle Douglas, McKayla Maroney and those other Americans glamorous enough to be in a girl group, cold-eyed enough to be in a girl gang.

Gabby Logan – brilliant. The Thorpedo – sparky. Jake Humphrey – not a prat after all. Sharron Davies – stop asking “How does it feel?”! Phil Jones – stop touching the athletes! John Inverdale – no one calls him the new Des Lynham anymore, still gives the impression he’d be happiest passing a rugby prop forward the soap in the showers, but did a more than decent job here. Michael Johnson and John McEnroe – both brilliant, can we keep them? And speaking of poetry, which Tyldesley doesn’t have, I didn’t hear nearly enough of the BBC’s most poetic commentator, Eddie Butler, during the Games (though his report on eugenics and the science of sprinting in the lead-up to the men’s 200m final was class).

Balding is generally reckoned to have been the Beeb’s top performer, and she was terrific, though a seasoned pro will always shine next to ex-sportsmen and women who can’t quite provide the insight for which they were presumably hired. Her report on the evolution of the female Olympian was, like Butler’s, an example of the excellent journalism which was standard at the Corporation before it started giving so much screen-time to star names. Nevertheless, it’s done 2012 proud. From Usain Bolt to the shy, retiring sports, it really did have these Games covered. A gold medal.

Now, as they say broadcasting, and with a heavy heart, it’s back to the football…