One of the glories of sport is the scope that it offers for debate and disagreement, friendly or otherwise. Yet the world of sport has been remarkably unanimous on one issue close to this paper’s heart — that Hugh McIlvanney was the greatest sports writer this country has ever produced.
Hugh, who has died at the age of 84, wrote for The Sunday Times for 23 years until he retired in 2016. He was greatly valued and loved by readers here and of The Observer, his previous newspaper, not only for his knowledge, long experience and authority, but for his peerless prose. Although he made it look effortless, that came from the hard slog of rewriting over and over again.
Hugh started his career in