MIKE DICKSON: A Question of Sport's end after more than half a century on our screens represents a merciful release for the once-great titan of British TV and serves as a frank reminder of the BBC's decline as a sports broadcaster

So Question of Sport has gone, mourned like a much-loved old friend who has lately been in in desperately poor health. A merciful release, one might say.

The world’s longest running TV sports quiz was put out of its misery last night, death by unforced error.

The diagnosis always looked terminal once Sue Barker was abruptly dropped as presenter three years ago, her captains Matt Dawson and Phil Tufnell ushered out at the same time.

Sacrificed in the name of modernisation, and the usually futile quest to find that elusive younger audience, their chemistry was never replicated by Paddy McGuinness, Sam Quek and Ugo Monye.

And thus comes to an end another fixture of the corporation’s output, one which had reached deep into the nation’s living rooms since its inception in 1970.

Its demise is sadly emblematic of the BBC’s decline as a sports broadcaster. It comes after a week which has seen the annual bafflement over the Sports Personality of the Year shortlist (no Josh Kerr), the loss of Test Match Special coverage next year in India, and more rows over the political opining of a superannuated presenter who links football highlights.

Barker’s loss was also felt this summer in the coverage of the Beeb’s now flagship sports event, Wimbledon, which sometimes seemed to be flailing in her absence.

It could be argued that QOS was already past its heyday before she was unceremoniously taken off it. Sustaining anything that has been around that long, and been such an institution, was never going to be easy in the era of the streaming giants and the increasingly atomised coverage of sport across so many different platforms.

Some will have been turned off the by the manner in which she was dismissed from the presenter’s chair after occupying it for 24 years.

The full extent of her hurt at how it was handled became clear with the release of her autobiography, in which she detailed her departure for the first time.

She described herself as ‘gobsmacked’ after being asked to make a statement that she was stepping down ‘for the good of the show’.

Referring to her lieutenants Dawson and Tufnell, she continued: ‘There seemed little understanding of our chemistry and the way we worked together, and little appreciation of all the years we'd put in to make sure each show was as good, if not better, than the last. The whole scenario was confusing and distressing.’

The popularity of the programme, back in the time when there were so few channels, is hard to overstate. A look at the line-up for its inaugural edition – the first of 1,365 – supports that.

The two captains were much-loved boxer Henry Cooper and Cliff Morgan, rugby player turned masterful broadcaster. The guests were Britain’s most charismatic footballer, George Best, England cricket captain Ray Illingworth, a true legend in Tom Finney and the enormously well-liked athlete Lillian Board.

The two original presenters were titans of sports broadcasting, David Vine and, in particular, David Coleman, who held the position for eighteen years.

Anyone who was anyone in British sport was invited on and not just happy to accept – they were eager to appear on a programme which held such a widespread appeal.

This extended to Princess Anne, who in 1987 came on as a team-mate of Emlyn Hughes not long after the skipper had guessed in the picture board round that she was the jockey John Reid.

A staggering 19 million people tuned in to see how they would get along, and were rewarded by the royal joining in the spirit and winding him up about whether he could deduce the correct gender of those on the picture board.

Hughes was among a number of high profile captains whose fame was reinforced, along with the likes of Gareth Edwards, Ian Botham and Bill Beaumont. The captaincy was male dominated in a way that would be considered unpalatable now, all banter and V-necked avuncularity.

But it was safe, jovial and a reassuring appointment to view. Efforts were rightly made to diversify, and it was a one-time female tennis star who oversaw the proceedings from 1997 onwards. She was informed of her departure in September 2020 to bring about change, and we now know the answer to a question which will always be synonymous with the show: ‘What happened next?’