Tony Jones (born 26 May 1958) is a football broadcaster based in England
. He
has contributed to all the commercial UK broadcasting outlets - Sky
Sports, five, Channel 4 and ITV - commentating on everything from
the UEFA Champions League to the English non-League.
He was part of the Hostbroadcastservices (HBS) team at the 2006
World Cup, and his voice has been heard on games distributed
overseas by TWI/IMG and Octagon/BT.
He has won a Royal Television Society award for his sports
reporting, and has also been responsible for producing several
programmes.
Work with ITV
Jones began his career in ITV in 1982 at Anglia Television in
Norwich, where he joined a sports department that included Gerry
Harrison, an established network commentator who was to later hold
an executive position with IMG.
Jones
commentated on football and produced a number of programmes -
including an insight into the horse racing industry and the arrival
in England of Sergei
Baltacha, a Ukrainian
who was the first footballer from the old Soviet Union
to play in Britain during the Glasnost era of the late 1980s. He also won
a Royal Television Society award for his journalism.
For the ITV network, he was a regular contributor to the Football
League review shows The Championship and Football League Extra. He
has also worked on ITV's FA Cup and UEFA Cup programming.
Work with Channel 4
Jones worked with Channel 4, commentating on the
Copa Libertadores with Tim Caple.
Work with five
Jones commentated on Five's
Football
Italiano show. With
five Jones has
also covered live UEFA Cup games and international fixtures.
Work with Sky Sports
Jones has been covering games for Sky Sports since 2002, starting
with the German Bundesliga.
In 2004, he became part of their team of commentators for Football
First - covering the English Premier League for audiences both in
the UK and overseas.
He has been a regular member of their UEFA Champions League
commentary team.
Other Credits
Jones was at Euro 2008 in Austria and Switzerland for UEFA,
covering games through to the semi-final between Germany and
Turkey.
Jones also worked for the Host Broadcaster at the 2006 FIFA World
Cup and for the 2002 event provided voice-over for a daily
highlights show.
Other FIFA tournaments covered include the World Under-20
Championships, along with the Futsal World Cup.
In October 2009, Jones was commentator (co-commentator David Pleat,
the former Tottenham Hotspur and Luton Town manager) when the
Ukraine v. England FIFA World Cup qualifying fixture became
Britain's biggest internet pay-to-view sports broadcast. Around
500,000 watched the game - produced by the Perform Group and their
partners Kentaro, an international football agency.
Although his work is mostly associated with football, Jones has
covered the water-polo finals at the FINA World Swimming
Championships and voiced a golf show.
His journalistic career started at the Cheshire Observer newspaper,
and his first radio work followed at Liverpool's Radio City.
Sources