James Alexander Gordon

Who was James Alexander Gordon?

James Alexander Gordon was a Scottish radio broadcaster, best known for reading the classified check of the football results every Saturday at 17:00 on BBC Radio Five Live's Sports Report.

Born in Edinburgh in 1936, during his youth he was paralysed with polio and he spent a large part of his childhood in hospital. He worked in music publishing before joining the BBC in 1972, becoming an announcer and newsreader until the early 1990s. In 1974 he followed in the footsteps of John Webster, reading the classified football results, first on Radio 2 and later on Five Live.

Popularly known as "Jag", he used his intonation, when pronouncing the names of the clubs, to indicate whether a match had ended in a home win, away win or draw.

Gordon also worked as a freelance voice artist, recording voice-overs and commenting on company videos.

He announced his retirement from radio in July 2013 following surgery to remove his larynx after being diagnosed with cancer. He was succeeded as the reader of the classified football results by former Radio 4 newsreader Charlotte Green from late September 2013.