Matchday DJ of the Week #37 – Tim Manns (Southampton F.C.)

Welcome back to ‘Matchday DJ Of The Week’, where in each issue we put 10 serious and not so serious quick-fire questions to a matchday DJ / announcer from the world of sport! This week we sat down for a chat with Southampton’s Tim Manns.

The Interview

SM: When did you take over as the PA Announcer at Southampton FC and how did the role come about?

TM: My first season as PA Announcer was 2020/21, which was during lockdown so I was announcing to an empty stadium, which was a very strange experience. I have been involved with the club since early 2004 when I took over as Station Director of The Saint, which was the club’s radio station. Subsequently I was pitch announcer in both the 2004/05 & 2005/06 seasons. I also wrote a book – Tie a Yellow Ribbon, How the Saints Won the Cup – for the 30th anniversary of the club’s 1976 FA Cup win.

I left the club in early 2007 but was still involved as manager of the Ex-Saints Association. Then, in 2015 I became a host in the hospitality suites. A former colleague at The Saint, Justin Gladys, had been the PA Announcer from the opening of St Mary’s Stadium in 2001 until he, very sadly, passed away. This led to me being asked to take on the role in the summer of 2020.

SM: Do you have a matchday routine you stick to in order to make sure matchdays go smoothly?

TM: I like to get to the stadium very early. We live in Somerset so, even on a good day, it is a two hour journey. Allowing for possible hold-ups I usually arrive about four hours before kick off. Most of the preparation is done the day before, printing out a sheet for noting substitutions and checking out potentially difficult pronunciations for the opposition.

SM: Do you have to do much preparation on non matchdays?

TM: I usually wait for the matchday manager’s email on the day before the game and read through the notes, but other than that it all tends to happen on a matchday.

SM: Had you carried out the PA role or any other role previously at any other clubs?

TM: I did one season as pitch announcer for Bath Rugby in the early 2000s. Rugby isn’t my sport but the radio station I was managing was owned by the then-owner of the rugby club, hence the connection.

SM: Your background is in radio. Can you tell us a bit about that and did you always think that could lead to working within football?

TM: I started in radio in 1979 when I joined Radio Bahrain in the Middle East. Luckily for me none of the other DJ’s were as interested in football as me and then in early 1980 a succession of top clubs – West Brom, Nottingham Forest and Liverpool – came to the island to play friendlies. I got to interview the managers and selected players and felt that it went well enough that I might be able to do more in the future.

After Bahrain I moved to Qatar. In 1994, I co-hosted the local television station (QTV) World Cup coverage and then in 1995 the country hosted the Youth World Cup. I contacted BBC World Service and was engaged to record twice-daily reports on the tournament. I also interviewed, amongst others, FIFA presidents Sepp Blatter and Joao Havelange.

I moved back to the UK in 1996, working for Orchard FM in Somerset initially and then Bath FM. I started to think that it might be a possibility to work in the game when football clubs started opening matchday radio stations. The Saint was more than that right from the beginning, being a 24/7 station on the Sky platform. I was keeping an eye on its progress and when they decided to develop it and advertised for someone to take over and run the project I applied and got the job.

SM: What’s your earliest memories of attending a live football match?

TM: My dad was a regular at The Dell from just before the second world war and started taking me and my brother when I was 10. I think my first game was against Swansea Town, as they were then known, in the old second division.

SM: So as a Saints fan, what’s it like working at the stadium and announcing the team you support on matchdays?

TM: The simplest answer is to say I don’t consider it as work. It is a privilege and I love every single minute of it.

SM: In your time supporting Southampton, who’s the best player you’ve seen wear the famous red and white strip?

TM: That is a tough question to answer. Honourable mentions for Ron Davies and Matt Le Tissier, but, for me, Mick Channon was the best.

SM: If you could choose, which song would you always pick to play on matchday?

TM: Easy. ‘When The Saints Go Marching In’, every time!

SM: Who is your favourite artist/band of all time?

TM: I was lucky enough to see the Beatles right at the beginning in 1963. I was very young but my parents took us to the Gaumont Theatre in Southampton. I have never forgotten that night and I still marvel at the quality of their music. Nobody else comes close in my opinion.

SM: On a final note, are there any funny mishaps or awkward moments that have taken place in your time as Saints’ PA announcer?

TM: In the 2004/05 season we were given a budget for pre-match entertainment and at one match, against Aston Villa, we had an ABBA tribute act. They had a small stage set up on the edge of the pitch and I was getting ready to go live with our pre-match build-up. It was, effectively, a live TV show screened around the stadium and above the pitch on the big screens. I was facing the camera with 30 seconds to “live” when an enormous Scotsman, who I recognised as Roy Aitken, the a Villa coach, got between me and the camera demanding that we remove the stage and microphones because he wanted his players to warm up in that spot.

I managed to move him aside with about three seconds to spare but it took all my powers of concentration to start the show without stumbling over the intro.

We’d like to say a huge thank you to Tim for taking the time to talk to us. We wish him and all of Saints’ players, staff and supporters the very best for the rest of the 2022/23 season.