Joaquim Maria Puyal

Today, I am going to talk about Joaquim Maria Puyal, the best sports commentator ever. (I am listening to him right now, FC Barcelona is playing against Xerez.) This is (hopefully) going to be my last post on this blog, so if someone is reading this, enjoy it now cause you will not be able to read me anymore!

Joaquim Maria Puyal i Ortiga is a Catalan journalist known for his work in television and radio. He was born in 1949 in Barcelona. He got a degree in Linguistics and another in Romance Philology (which has nothing to do with his actual job at the radio station, I know). After that, he started a degree in Communication Sciences. When he was 27, he decided that he would develop his career exclusively in Catalan, because he thought that the work of journalists could play a decisive role in its normalization (after its repression during Franco's dictatorship).

In 1967 he started working with Ràdio Barcelona, a tiny radio station. He remained there for many years doing various roles until the station's director asked him if he could broadcast a soccer match. He accepted it and that is when he started his job as a sports commentator.

Puyal narrated the first Catalan-language broadcast of a soccer match since the Second Republic. During Franco's dictatorship Catalan had been forbidden in every official institution, but games had been broadcast in Catalan before the Civil War. Puyal realised he had to work with linguists to create the specialized vocabulary needed to analyse soccer (most of the words came from English: corner, offside, penalty, goal... and had its equivalent in Spanish, but not in Catalan).

After Franco's death, he made the proposal to broadcast matches in Catalan to the director of Cadena Ser, a Spanish radio station, because he thought he could do it with the democratic air that was starting to appear in Spain. Cadena SER accepted the project and the new programme was called 'Futbol en català'. The programme became quickly very successful.

In 1985 Puyal left Ràdio Barcelona and started working with Catalunya Ràdio, the most important radio station in Catalunya. Since that moment he has narrated every official match played by FC Barcelona, which makes more than 2,000 games.(He is still working with Catalunya Ràdio.)

Joaquim Maria Puyal's popularity and prestige is due as much to his radio career as to his work in television. He has directed, produced and presented various programs, all in the Catalan language.

In television, he began working on the Catalan circuit of Televisión Española. He started in 1977 presenting the programme 'Vostè pregunta'. In 1985 he signed with TV3 to direct and present the programme 'Vostè jutja', then he started with another programme with 'La vida és un xip' and then with 'Un tomb per la vida'. He collaborated with some other programmes in which he was not the presenter 'Tres pics i repicó' and 'El joc del segle'. He gave the first professional opportunity to many notable Catalan journalists such as Antoni Bassas, Xavier Bosch, Manel Fuentes, Ricard Torquemada (he works with him currently) and Mònica Terribas.

He has many awards for his work in television and in radio. Joaquim Maria Puyal is by far the most popular sports commentator in Catalan (and the best one). He is not like the sports commentators we are used to listen to, he is kind, he can talk properly, he knows everything about soccer but about many other things too. He stands out amongst his mates because he is humble and he talks like a professional, not like a plain fan (it is sad, but sports press and sports journalists are not real journalists, they are just supporters).

Listening to him, you learn lots of things about soccer and really enjoy it. He talks clearly, he expains everything about the match and the players and the most important thing: he does not talk as if he knew everything and he does not commentate on matches under his point of view, he does it as objectively as he can. If you have the chance to listen to him, instead of listening to TV sports commentators, switch on the radio and listen to him! Our frequency here is 106,7.