There's snow business like toe-curling commentary

No more slopestyle, halfpipe, long hill Nordic combined, or mixed relay biathlon. We'll all briefly discuss taking up curling but do nothing about it, then return to our usual diet of things which take place instead on muddy fields.

But my, oh my, how Auntie's team of trusted sporting anchors have floundered at times in Sochi.

With Clare Balding commanding the Olympic park like the trusted national treasure we know and love (albeit reduced to carrying her outside broadcast kit in a glorified shopping trolley), commentary teams in the outlying venues haven't been quite so reassuring.

We've had middle distance runner Steve Cram pretending to know the ins and outs of curling, and being constantly cussed by his summariser.

Athletics veteran Paul Dickenson getting names and split times round his neck at the height of Lizzie Yarnold's gold medal winning skeleton success.

And finally 1970s tennis player Sue Barker, that well known ice skating expert, seeking to lead us through the salchows in the individual and pairs competitions.

Proof, if ever it was needed, that these BBC favourites are not Jacks and Jills of all trades – nor, to be fair, should they be expected to be.

Laughably, while this festival of winter sport was being played out, Olympic commentary veteran Barry Davies was cast out into the wilderness, reduced instead to watching the likes of Sinitta, Anthea Turner and Darren Gough as they plopped off the end of a baby ski jump on Channel Four's most bonkers reality show, The Jump.

Personally, I blame the late, great Tony 'Gobbledegook' Gubba. The only reason to possibly tune into ITV's risible reality series Dancing on Ice used to be to hear his laughable attempts at making the celebrities' 3mph antics sound difficult, and dangerous.

"Ah, there's the upside town twirly-whirly backward windmill," he'd say. "And then they were straight into the uppy-downy grandfather clock with exaggerated hair flick." And all delivered with the straightest of faces. Priceless.

Thanks in no small part to Tony, it seems anything, and anyone goes in the commentary booth these days.

My favourite Sochi moment came when snowboarder Jenny Jones won her historic bronze medal under the watchful, and rather tearful eyes of Ed Leigh, Tim Warwood and her über-excited team-mate Aimee Fuller.

Swept up by the thrills and tension, young Aimee cheered when a rival's fall confirmed Jones' medal. Judging by the number of complaints to the BBC, some found her gushing enthusiasm and raw emotion irritating, rather than endearing.

But are you telling me that people in homes across the land weren't cheering and punching the air in just the same way? I don't get the big fuss about biased commentary. People didn't have a go at the legendary Harry Carpenter for yelling "That's it, go on Frank" when Mr Bruno threatened to topple Mike Tyson in the heavyweight boxing ring.

And he was encouraging someone to knock another fella's block off. Know what I mean . . . ?