My 2nd selection was the miracle at Medina ..... the European come back for that was simply spectacular and it been on US soil just made it sweeter. Like my first choice there's a link to my family with this one too. My Mum and and Aunty Kath were out there to watch this as it happened. Mum was 6 months out from the end of her breast cancer treatment and she tired easily so she didn't do much walking following the players and spent a lot of time in hospitality watching on the screens in the shade with a drink but she loved every minute of it. They got back so pumped up, super happy to have been there to watch the iconic win. It was then that mum confessed she had an appointment with the cancer doctors again in a couple of days later on October 2nd because they thought it was back again - they were right, mum lived another year and died on October 2nd 2013
It's hard to determine what is defining. Bruno finally winning the world title on his fourth attempt Lewis becoming undisputed* world champion The GB Ladies curling team in 2002 - I really think this should be there. There's no argument it gripped the nation. Jenson Button’s world championship season
Not a piss take. It’s not defining per se but the country was gripped by curling fever during that Winter Olympics. 6m people sat up in the middle of the night to watch that final. Whenever I see these lists I don’t look at them in a pure sporting sense. It’s not what is the best achievement, it’s what is a great moment and moments are not just made up of sporting achievement alone. It’s also about the story behind it, how it captures the public’s imagination and so on.
Just over the 30yr threshold but Linford Christie winning the 100m gold at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992. Pretty sure it was David Coleman commentating on it as well. Hairs still stand up on the back of my neck when I see this.
The one that sticks in my mind from those games was the great man calling Sally Gunnell's win in the 400 metre hurdles. I guess it was the alliteration of "Gunnell going for gold and Gunnell gets the gold" that did it at the time because, when you listen back to it, he doesn't seem to reach the same level of excitement as with Christie a few days earlier. But, in the context of her losing the World Championship gold the year before, the line before that of "and she gets it right" was just perfect. There have been very, very few broadcasters who could present and commentate equally well and, for me, Coleman was the best of the lot by some distance. As for Christie, his World Championship win in '93 was probably better given all the sniping that he'd only won the Olympic title because all the big guns weren't there.
