6-0-6

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606 Football Phone-In

Genre	Phone-in
Country	United Kingdom
Languages	English
Home station	BBC Radio 5 Live previously BBC Radio 5
Recording studio	London, England
Air dates	since 1991
Audio format	FM, Digital radio and Digital TV
Website	Official Website
	Official Podcast

6-0-6 (pronounced six-oh-six) is a football phone-in, broadcast on BBC Radio Five Live throughout the football season; when the programme started, it typically went on air at 6:06pm on a matchday (when schedules allow). It covers topics relating to the current affairs of football in the United Kingdom. It currently airs on Saturdays and Sundays. As well as listeners phoning in, a selection of texts and e-mails to the studio are read out.

The programme was inspired by long running BBC Local radio football phone-ins such as the BBC Radio Sheffield programme.^[1]

6-0-6's current theme tune is an arrangement of "1901" from Phoenix.

Contents 1 Presenter history 2 Programme features 3 6-0-6 online forum 4 Spin-offs 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Presenter history

Originally the programme was broadcast only once a week, on Saturdays after Sports Report. It gets its name from the (approximate) time the show starts on a Saturday evening — six minutes past six.^[2] Its original host was Danny Baker (1991–92, 1996–97, 2008–). David Mellor (1992–2001) presented 6-0-6 for much of the 1990s and early on in the 2000s and was for a long time its regular Wednesday-evening presenter. Other previous hosts have involved Richard Littlejohn (1997–2002), Dominik Diamond, Adrian Chiles (2001–06), Jonathan Pearce (2002–03) and Tim Lovejoy (2007-09). Issy Clarke for many years in the 2000s read out emails and text messages before she moved to Baker's new Saturday morning show.

Regular presenters include DJ Spoony, who does Sundays with Gabriele Marcotti; and Alan Green, who has normally commentated on a game the same day (mostly Saturdays). Occasional presenters include Mark Lawrenson, Steve Claridge, Mark Chapman, Mark Bright, and Manish Bhasin. Danny Baker returned to 6-0-6 to present six Euro 2008 specials, and proved such a big hit with the listeners that he was invited back to present regularly on Tuesdays.^[3]

Under Baker in the '90s the show favoured bizarre and obscure but hilarious topics, avoiding the matches played and headline news in the football. There was also music in its first years. However, from Mellor onwards, the show became established as a more mainstream phone-in, mainly focusing on Premier League teams.

[edit] Programme features

This season (2009/10) you can visit the 606 Soapbox outside grounds. Fans can drop into the Soapbox and speak live down the line to presenters Spoony and Gabriele Marcotti. The soapbox travels round the country and stops every three weeks at a different football club. Sunday's 606 also has a weekly celebrity fan, reporting on the game they have been to that day. Celebrity fans have so far included Norman Jay (Spurs), Trevor Nelson (Cheslea), Tony Jeffries (Sunderland) and the Phelps twins aka the Weasley twins from Harry Potter (Birmingham and Aston Villa).

[edit] 6-0-6 online forum

In addition to the phone-in programme, there is also an online version of 6-0-6 in the form of an Internet message board, although in June 2006 the site was forced to temporarily close due to the large amount of web traffic and forum threads.^[4] Football, cricket, rugby union, rugby league, snooker, motorsport and several other sports have messageboards embedded into 606.

[edit] Spin-offs

Other sports occasionally get the 6-0-6 treatment. These include Tennis, where the show became 6 Love 6 presented by John McEnroe, Cricket and Formula 1 where Murray Walker presents.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• 606 Homepage news.BBC.co.uk