football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...
commentator who works for
Sky Sports
Sky Sports is a group of British broadcasting of sports events, subscription sports channels operated by the satellite television, satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television ...
Dorset
Dorset ( ; Archaism, archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north and the north-east, Hampshire to the east, t ...
and attended Broadway Secondary School.
Prior to his television career, Crocker commentated for
Capital Gold
The Capital Gold radio station started in London in 1988 on Capital Radio's AM frequency, after the Independent Broadcasting Authority had urged stations to end simulcasting (broadcasting the same programmes simultaneously on AM and FM) and th ...
in London, alongside Jonathan Pearce and Steve Wilson (who are both now BBC commentators). He then spent several years with
BRMB
BRMB is a British radio station based in Aston, Birmingham, which is owned and operated by Murfin Music International. It broadcasts on 89.1FM in Aston and surrounding areas, on DAB throughout Birmingham, and online via the station's website a ...
in Birmingham commentating on
Aston Villa
Aston Villa Football Club (commonly referred to as simply Villa) is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club, founded in 1874, compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The team have p ...
and
Birmingham City
Birmingham City Football Club is a professional football club based in Birmingham, England. Formed in 1875 as Small Heath Alliance, it was renamed Small Heath in 1888, Birmingham in 1905, and Birmingham City in 1943. The team compete in the ...
. During this period, Crocker began providing occasional commentaries for
BSkyB
Sky UK Limited (formerly British Sky Broadcasting Limited (BSkyB)), trading as Sky, is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television, broadband internet, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers ...
. He covered some live Premier League matches during Sky's first season of coverage 1992/93, before joining permanently in 1997.Archived a Ghostarchive and th Wayback Machine
After joining Sky, Crocker commentated regularly on
Premier League
The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...
matches, but was best known for his four years (1998–2002) as the voice of Scottish football, covering live matches from the
Scottish Premier League
The Scottish Premier League (SPL) was the Scottish football league system, top-level league competition for professional Association football, football clubs in Scotland. The league was founded in 1998, when it broke away from the Scottish Foo ...
,
Scottish Cup
The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Scottish internationals. After Sky lost the rights to the SPL, Crocker became Sky's chief football league commentator between 2002 and 2006.
Although being given occasional live Premier League matches between 2005 and 2006, Crocker was clearly behind the Sky "Big Four" of Martin Tyler, Rob Hawthorne, Alan Parry and Ian Darke in the commentating pecking order. As a result, Crocker left Sky to progress his career with Setanta Sports, working for them during the following three years. Crocker was Setanta's lead commentator on the SPL, and also shared commentating duties with Jon Champion on Setanta's 46 'live' Premier League games.
Setanta
went into administration
As a legal concept, administration is a procedure under the insolvency laws of a number of common law jurisdictions, similar to bankruptcy in the United States. It functions as a rescue mechanism for insolvent entities and allows them to carry on ...
in June 2009 and the UK side of their broadcasting operations was wound up soon after. Crocker went freelance and spent the next season (2009–2010) working for a variety of different outlets. Setanta's sports rights were carved up, with some of the SPL matches returning to Sky, and Crocker was contracted to be Sky's SPL commentator again, seven years after he had previously fulfilled the role. Crocker also worked on UEFA Champions League matches for STV who produced their own in-house coverage, with separate commentary and presentation, of the same matches shown on ITV1. Crocker was also contracted to work for ITV1 on their FA Cup Highlights shows, as well as being heard by an international audience commentating on Premier League matches for
Premier League Productions
Premier League Productions is an IMG (company), IMG-produced company with studio shows and commentators for worldwide viewers of Premier League association football.
English-language broadcast team
The company has a group of UK based commentators, ...
.
Crocker travelled to South Africa for the 2010 World Cup where he was ITV's fourth commentator, covering two matches live and several other matches for their highlights shows, including Switzerland's defeat of Spain, and Portugal's 7–0 victory over North Korea.
In September 2010, it was announced that Ian Darke was leaving Sky Sports to join ESPN America as their leading football commentator. Crocker was subsequently re-signed by Sky Sports on a permanent basis as an integral part of their football commentating line-up. Crocker commentates frequently for Sky Sports coverage of Scottish football.