THE BEST JOB ON THE PLANET

Tim Vickery, born London 1965, is a major football correspondent working from Rio de Janeiro where he has lived since 1995. He trained to be a Teacher of English as a Foreign Language and moved to Brazil to teach English. Fluent in Spanish and Portuguese, his major credits are with BBC Sport, World Soccer, Sports' Illustrated, an analyst on SporTV and frequently on Talksport and in the World Football Phone in between 2-4am on Radio 5, Saturday mornings, where he is known as the “legendhino” and “Vikipedia”. There is nothing he does not know about South American football. He has recently given expert views on the return of Anderson to his home country and Internacional and on latest signing to Chelsea, Colombian, Cuadrado, whom Vickery rates highly.

If you can get a podcast or stay up late, Vickery is definitely worth a listen.

By the way it is Jim Proudfoot's 1000^th match report coming up tonight, watching Bolton v Liverpool, having started with “DevonAir” reporting local matches in 1991. His worst reporting position was at a match at Blackpool v Yeovil when he was placed far away from the action and without cover, as the club was redeveloping the ground. The ladder to the “Gantry” at Portsmouth above the main stand at Fratton Park, was vertical and a nightmare to climb, there have been open press boxes exposed to the elements and of course issues over “calls of nature”. It is not always the best job!

His most memorable matches were the FA Cup Semi Manchester Utd v Arsenal in 1999, covering for local Manchester radio, when Peter Schmeichel saved a penalty and Ryan Giggs scored that great goal following a mazy dribble. The other was the 2000 European Champions League final between Valencia v Barcelona, probably the noisiest and most exciting match he ever experienced, at the Stade de France, won by Valencia 4-1.