Ray Stubbs

Why organisations work with Ray Stubbs

• Four decades anchoring live football, darts and snooker on BBC, ESPN, BT Sport and Talksport mean the interviewing reflex is current, not nostalgic. The questions land because the format has been his daily job, not an occasional engagement.
• He has presented every major international tournament across 1994 to 2008 for BBC Sport, including World Cups, European Championships, the 1998 Winter Olympics and the 1998 Commonwealth Games. That is a rare working knowledge of how big sport actually unfolds for an audience.
• The football network is real. Years fronting Football Focus alongside Mark Lawrenson and reporting from inside the England camp at Euro 96 and France 98 have left him with the contact book to put credible names on a sports-themed corporate panel.
• He has presented FA Cup finals on ESPN and the World Seniors Darts Championship most recently, which gives him cross-sport range when the brief is not strictly football.

Biography highlights

• Lead football presenter, ESPN UK, 2009 to 2013, including live coverage of the FA Cup finals
• Lead reporter, BT Sport, from launch through 2016
• Presenter of Football Focus, BBC One, 1999 to 2004, alongside Mark Lawrenson
• BBC England football reporter from 2007; on-the-ground reporter at Euro 96 and the 1998 FIFA World Cup
• Co-host of BBC snooker coverage with Hazel Irvine; lead presenter of BBC darts coverage
• Presenter, World Seniors Darts Championship, 2023 and 2024
• Former junior professional footballer at Tranmere Rovers and former Commercial Director of the club

Biography

Live network sports presenting is one of the most exposed jobs in British broadcasting. Three hours of cup-final coverage, a tournament closing ceremony, a darts final going to a deciding leg, with no autocue and a paying audience in millions. Ray Stubbs has done that job across BBC, ESPN, BT Sport and Talksport for more than forty years.

The BBC years were the spine. Stubbs joined BBC Radio Merseyside in 1983, moved to BBC Manchester in 1986, and went on to anchor Football Focus from 1999 to 2004 with Mark Lawrenson. He covered every major international football tournament from the 1994 World Cup in the United States through to Euro 2008, including Euro 96 and France 98 from inside the England camp, and presented the BBC’s darts and snooker output alongside Hazel Irvine.

In 2009 he left the BBC for ESPN as lead presenter of the network’s new UK Premier League coverage, fronting the FA Cup finals of 2011, 2012 and 2013. The move to BT Sport at the rebrand made him one of its lead reporters through 2016. Most recently he has presented the World Seniors Darts Championship in 2023 and 2024 and works for Talksport.

The reason organisations book him is not access to a thesis; it is access to a presenter who has held network sports rooms together for forty years and has the football, darts and snooker contact book to fill a stage. That is a working broadcaster, not a guest celebrity.

Key speaking topics

• Sports dinner hosting and after-dinner speaking
• Conference and award-evening chairing
• Panel moderation with sports figures and executives
• Live event presentation and Q&A
• Football, darts and snooker broadcast insight
• Corporate hospitality hosting

Ideal for

• Sponsor and hospitality dinners around football, darts, snooker and major tournaments
• Annual corporate award evenings looking for a recognised sports broadcaster as host
• Sports industry conferences needing a moderator across player, executive and media panels
• Internal company events with a sports theme or sports-personality lineup

Audience outcomes

• An evening paced with network broadcast timing, on the clock and on the brief
• Sports-figure panellists drawn out beyond standard interview lines by a peer who has chaired them on TV
• Anecdote and analysis from inside England camps, World Cup tournaments and FA Cup finals
• A host the audience already knows from BBC, ESPN and BT Sport, which raises the perceived weight of the agenda