Auntie Beeb rises to occasion despite wind and windbags

TV VIEWBBC's coverage of the British Open Championship represents a kind of Utopia for golfing enthusiasts. It's an uninterrupted, unabridged nine-hour live golf-fest, and that doesn't even include the time devoted to the highlights programme each night.

Unlike Setanta Sports and Sky Sports, who to pay the bills must genuflect with infuriating frequency at the altar of advertising, Auntie Beeb inflicts no such distractions.

It's a tough remit to fill that time slot with live golf, especially as there are viewers whose dedication/inertia prevents them from escaping the couch for hours at a time, comfort breaks notwithstanding.

There have to be imaginative, magazine-style inserts and thoughtful trivia to retain the hearts and minds of viewers coping with gruelling shifts in front of the television.

In the interests of research, this column went without fresh air and exercise for two days - stress testing a marriage in the process - to ascertain if the BBC paired quantity with quality.

The results of our dedication suggest they do - but only periodically on any given day.

The footage of live golf needs to be complemented by interesting - not overly wordy or intrusive - soundtrack, and it's this balance in the commentary box that proved hit-and-miss over the four days. It was indeed one of several weaknesses.

Peter Alliss has commitments to a US broadcaster during the British Open so he flits between two commentary boxes. The BBC misses him when he's not there.

He's a man who polarises opinion, but for the majority of listeners he is an entertaining, slight eccentric, voice of golf.

He can be whimsical and is definitely a product of his generation in terms of some of his opinions, be they on sport or life outside it. He is, though, largely forthright in his assessments of the game and the golfers, and that helps to provide substance.

In his absence the coverage can become a wishy-washy love in behind the microphone.

This is glaring when Mark James, Sam Torrance and Ken Brown are in the booth.

The former Ryder Cup captain James sounds like the cartoon character Droopy. Droll observations are his forte but it's hard to escape the feeling there are too many in-jokes and too much chumminess when the three are pitched together.

Torrance is the easiest on the ear, offering a supportive role in exhorting the competitors as if he were standing on the other side of the gallery ropes. Brown, to his credit, has gone from largely colourless player to highly competent broadcaster.

The one cavil concerns his "Ken on the course" segments focusing on the challenges posed by the various fairways and greens. The po-faced delivery lends a little too much gravitas in the context of professional sportsmen being asked to acquit themselves capably in their métier - they're hardly splitting the atom.

It was possible too to overdose on the Scottish burr of Torrance and Andrew Cotter, but it was the distinctive tone of the former tour professional Australian Wayne Grady that proved the most captivating. Grady's knowledge, authority and humour made him comfortably the most entertaining presence behind the microphone.

Conducting pre- and post-round interviews is no easy assignment, largely because the interviewee is unlikely to stray from the banalities - the viewer is unlikely to hear the golfer reveal he would rather have toenails removed without anaesthetic than play in 40mph winds.

The golfer will insist he's happy with his swing, is ready for what the course has to throw at him, and will be concentrating on one hole at a time.

The gales that assailed Royal Birkdale made it all a matter of gruesome fascination - watching the world's best playing from places on the links you'd expect to find the bodies of a couple of high-handicap amateurs.

Interestingly, the BBC's anchor Gary Lineker was given far less screen presence than when at the helm of the coverage at the US Masters. It didn't detract from the BBC's coverage; Lineker offers little in terms of either sparkling wit or specialist knowledge.

What made the weekend was the captivating central theme to the 137th British Open: the 53-year-old Greg Norman defying ageist clichés, fearless on course and wonderfully understated and self-deprecating in interviews.

There was a maturity to his pronouncements, forged in the fires of a previous golfing life in which he endured far more heartache than any one individual should have had to bear.

If he had not been blocking the path of Pádraig Harrington - who shares many of Norman's no-nonsense qualities - many Irish would surely have been rooting for the Australian.

Instead a nation once again plugged into the BBC to reprise five hours of sporting theatre, hoping for the same result as 12 months ago.

Once again it proved a heart-stopping journey - particularly around the turn - but Harrington produced another fantastic sporting odyssey to capture hearts, minds and, ultimately, the Claret Jug.

"Peter Alliss is a man who polarises opinion. He can be whimsical and is definitely a product of his generation in terms of some of his opinions, be they on sport or on life outside it. He is, though, largely forthright in his assessments of the game and the golfers, and that helps to provide substance . . .