King of the mountains: "Phil Liggett: The Voice of Cycling"

For any newcomers out there, Phil Liggett is to cycling what Murray Walker was to Formula One or Henry Blofeld is to cricket. In conjunction with Paul Sherwen - the analyst's analyst - Liggett provided the commentary on Channel 4 and ITV's expert Tour de France coverage from the 1980s onwards, giving shape and context to this most extraordinary of sporting spectacles, before shipping out to NBC Sports (and a presumably generous retirement plan) in the latter half of the last decade. Affectionate to the point of indulgence, the Australian-produced tribute doc Phil Liggett: The Voice of Cycling converts tried-and-tested anecdotes from the touring show An Evening with Phil Liggett into well-illustrated cinematic form: it's Liggett in his own choice words, now 75 going on 76, and attempting to reconnect with the great passion of his life in the aftermath of the Lance Armstrong affair (during which he was very much on the wrong side journalistically) and Sherwen's unexpected death in 2018. His keynote remains that paternal gentleness that became a feature of those long Tour stages where the only thing going on was a gradual reshuffling of the peloton. I warn you now, there will be dad jokes; an early flick through the Liggett scrapbooks sets out young Philip's own achievements on a bike, first as a successful day racer, then as a rolling reporter. Yet even for seasoned Tour viewers, surprises emerge. Liggett and his wife Trish, a sometime administrative assistant on the Milk Race, spend the offseason on a vast nature reserve in South Africa (as Sherwen made a second home for himself in Uganda), and the old commentary-box calmness resurfaces whenever the film's subject finds himself face-to-face with elephants, giraffes and his beloved rhinos. He's a keen birdwatcher, too, setting us to wonder whether a heightened eye for colour and line of flight has made it easier for Liggett to differentiate between the swooping forms of, say, Mark Cavendish and Peter Sagan in a sprint lead-out train.

Much as Le Tour typically strays into bordering territories (Andorra, this year), some of this material might be described as Partridge-adjacent. The archive yields footage of Liggett resplendent in blazer and tie, overseeing the Tour of Ireland through a car sunroof; one year, he introduced Tour of Holland coverage while surrounded by what tabloid editors would call "a bevy of blonde lovelies". A fond, hilariously bathetic episode finds Trish attending a ballroom dancing event while her husband sits in the car park reading his new cycling book. There's even a bit on a barge. Yet the figure who emerges from the broadcast truck is someone who's put the hours in, cares deeply about the sport, and has thought long and hard about its connection to the wider world. An event as all-encompassing as the Tour de France isn't just a race; it's also a tour of French landmarks, and - as borne out by the frequent cutaways to mares running alongside the main field or sheep dyed in the King of the Mountains colours - a three-week safari in its own right. The more experience any commentator can bring to describing all that and the day's pedalling, the better. The Voice of Cycling runs just shy of two hours, and towards the end, you start to feel as though it could go on for three, four, five, the length of an average day in the saddle, because Liggett has 50 years of stories to reflect upon: the LeMond/Fignon rivalry, the rise-and-fall of Armstrong (interestingly evoked, with observers daring to propose Liggett was blinded to the truth, either through innate human goodness - a need to believe what he'd seen on the monitors - or total naivety) and his relationship with his great pal - and onscreen "wife" - Sherwen. Cyclonuts will coo at the reams of varyingly faded race footage (look sharp for the promotional go-kart with the giant profiterole on its roof); there are cameos from Dickie Davies, Richard Keys and Arnold Schwarzenegger. As for the man himself, The Voice of Cycling confirms an impression first gained during those long afternoons as Le Tour wound its way through the Languedoc: that in any environment, Phil Liggett would be tremendously good company.

Phil Liggett: The Voice of Cycling will be available to book via Demand.Film UK from Friday - details here. It also screens at Saffron Screen, Saffron Walden on August 1st.