'At the end of each Grand National I would say: I'm never doing that again!'

He has rung within minutes of the request being made, just as one of his former BBC colleagues promised he would. He checks it's me and I check it's him, more as a humourous aside than a real question. Even without identifying himself, the man on the line is unmistakably Des Lynam.

It is a pleasure to hear his voice, now as much as it was then, back in the days when Lynam was the face of sport on BBC television.

Through most of the last century's final two decades he did it all – the Olympics, football's World Cup and Euros, Match of the Day, Wimbledon, Grandstand, Sportsnight, the World Athletics Championships and boxing. He was the man for the big occasion. For 15 consecutive years one of the very biggest occasions was the Grand National.