Brian Madley, a sports writer at The People for more than 30 years, has died after a short illness. He was 72.
Born near Cardiff, Madley began his career as a copy boy on the South Wales Echo, rising to cover Test match cricket, Olympic Games and British Lions tours before eventually becoming chief soccer writer at The People.
Madley, the cousin of former Observer sports editor Peter Corrigan, was inducted into Wales’s Sports Hall of Fame in 2000, following his retirement in 1998 after 37 years on Fleet Street papers.
“Rugby, cricket, boxing, athletics, horse racing, you name it, and Brian Madley wrote about it with an authority that few of his contemporaries could match,†Peter Jackson, the former Daily Mail rugby correspondent, said.
Ken Montgomery, a colleague and close friend of Madley, said: ”He was a superb journalist. His death will be felt widely throughout the sports world as well as among those who work in newspapers.”
Madley died in hospital in his home town of Chelmsford, Essex, last Thursday.
He is survived by his son, Jonathan, and daughter, Katrina.
The funeral will be at the Writtle Road Crematorium, Chelmsford, CM1 3BL next Wednesday, August 19, at 10.15am, and afterwards at The Original Plough pub, next to Chelmsford Railway Station.
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