‘I don't look back very easily, but I do look forward’, says Martin Tyler on World Cup eve

The legendary SBS World Cup broadcaster reflects on how times have changed in football since calling his first FIFA World Cup as a commentator in 1978.

SOUTHAMPTON - OCTOBER 16: Sky television commentator Martin Tyler in the commentary boxbefore the Euro 2004 Championship Qualifying match between England and Macedonia on October 16, 2002 at St. Mary's Stadium in Southampton, England. (Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images) Credit: Mike Hewitt/Getty Images

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Richie Benaud. Sir Peter O’Sullevan. Murray Walker. Martin Tyler.

It’s elite company, but then again, not many broadcasters can say they’ve been the sound track of a sport across generations.

SBS football viewers have been spoiled down the years as Tyler, whose voice is synonymous with the game around the world, brought to life some of the FIFA World Cup’s most extraordinary moments from 1990 to now, with the exception of 2010.

And this year, Tyler will be in the SBS commentary position for an eighth time.

“I’m really looking forward to a different kind of experience, but with familiar friends,” Tyler told fellow SBS World Cup commentator David Basheer.

“It’s going to be intense, it’s going to be exciting.”

Tyler’s first FIFA World Cup as a commentator was in 1978 in Argentina.

That was 44 years ago, and times have changed when it comes to player accessibility, which makes preparation more difficult than it used to be.

“I do like the personal touch, if you like,” he said.

“I like to go to training, I like to meet the players, find out how to pronounce their names, which sometimes is a bit different, what they say and what we’ve been told, and generally be around team hotels.

“It’s not so easy now.”

Tyler is a football man to his bootstraps.

As well as a stellar career as a broadcaster, he has coached for 20 years too, a part of the game that has changed arguably more rapidly than any other in recent decades.

“My one worry about football is that it’s overcoached, that it’s about the coaches when it’s about the players,” Tyler said.

“They’re the ones that have that special moment, and provide those moments of magic.

“I hope the players are the ones we’re going to be talking about.”

There’s no sepia-tinge to Tyler’s recollections, either.

He may be on the verge of a 12^th FIFA World Cup in all - and 13 if you include working as a producer on the 1974 tournament – but Tyler is only looking in one direction.

“The truth is, it’s the next game that matters,” he said.

“All that’s happened, that’s done. It’s been a wonderful journey, but rightly I should be judged on the next game.

“I can’t look back very easily because I can’t do anything about it.

“But I do look forward.”