British readers will be familiar with the Sky Sports programme Soccer Saturday, hosted until recently by the great Jeff Stelling. It's essentially five hours of rotund ex-footballers describing matches which they watch live on monitors but the viewer can't see.
Middle-aged men talking about football is not a format that should work, and yet somehow, it has become firmly embedded must-watch TV. A similar observation might be levelled at the Squash Radio podcast.
Co-hosted by American tournament MC Bill Buckingham and former British champion and Squash TV commentator Paul Johnson (aka PJ), Squash Radio is about to enter its ninth year on the digital airwaves.
Aside from the occasional big-name guest, it's just two affable, knowledgable guys talking about the latest happenings on the PSA Tour, seasoned by tasty sprinklings of candour, gossip, critique and opinion.
While PJ is slightly more sensitive in his observations on players (due to having to rub shoulders with them on Tour), it's fair to say that Buckingham releases the handbrake every time the recording light goes red. To put it colloquially, he doesn't give a s**t.
"I'm at the stage of life now where I don't particularly feel the need to edit what I say," Buckingham tells Squash Player. "I'm a non-entity in the squash world for the most part, so nothing I say can actually affect me anyway."
'Non-entity' is inaccurate. Buckingham is a well-known figure on the US squash scene as MC at tournaments such as the Windy City Open and Squash On Fire Open. Previously, he worked for US Squash for 18 years in a variety of roles.
His career began in the hospitality business which led to becoming sports marketing director for the Greater New Haven region of Connecticut. Part of that role was to attract big sports competitions to the region and organise logistics. One of those events was the 1999 US Junior Open at Yale University.
"I met with Brian and Mark Talbot to discuss the event," he remembers. "I was in my 30s, but hadn't exercised in years. I even drove the four blocks to their office!
"I had never even heard of squash before, so they gave me a racket, shoes and a pass to the gym. I started playing squash that week and before long I was playing at Yale every day. I lost all the weight, started going to the ToC and supporting Yale in college squash when Julian Illingworth was their big star."
Working on Yale's events led to a job offer from US Squash CEO Kevin Klipstein which began a long working relationship between the pair. The undulating course of that colleagueship and the fortunes of US Squash are one of Buckingham's frequent topics of often astoundingly candid discussion on Squash Radio.
Buckingham describes how Klipstein's 'dressing down' of a volunteer at the US Open at Drexel in 2011 indirectly led to him becoming a tournament MC. The volunteer in question quit on the spot, and Buckingham was hastily assigned to fill the vacancy, which developed into taking the microphone during the qualifiers and first two rounds.
Gilly Lane was the regular MC on the US Open showcourt, but when he was at a friend's wedding in 2018, Buckingham took over. He was in his element, using his rasping east coast tones and infectious joviality to immediately put players at ease in on-court interviews.
That led to a call from an impressed Amr Khalifa asking Buckingham to take the mic for a tournament at the famous Black Ball Club in Cairo, and so a new career was born. Buckingham retired from US Squash in 2024 aged 62.
Another US Squash employee, Connor O'Malley, had founded the Squash Radio podcast in 2017 as a long-form interview show and invited Buckingham to be part of it during the pandemic. With Bill's influence, it shifted to a more irreverent chat show format with PJ and Joey Barrington as occasional guests.
When O'Malley left, Buckingham took over and roped in PJ as his sidekick, keeping the casual format with the occasional special guest punctuating their barstool-style dialogue.
In a recent development, Squash Radio has pooled with rivals Squash University and The Rally Report under the umbrella of the 'Squash Podcast Network' in order to attract more advertisers, a move which is already bearing fruit to their collective benefit.
But the presence of corporate backers will not dilute Buckingham's acerbic observations of the professional squash world. He says: "We do occasionally cut bits out if either of us in uncomfortable, but it's fair to say that doesn't happen too often!"
SQUASH PODCASTS
Squash Player Podcast
Our very own podcast launched in May and is now seven episodes old. Our editor Nathan Clarke hosts and guests are immediately eased into in-depth, almost therapy-like sitdowns that reveal under-the-bonnet emotions, motivations and fascinating anecdotes.
In Squash
Host Gerry Gibson is truly 'The Podfather' with 380 episodes in his back catalogue. The Emirates-based Canadian has welcomed almost every major figure in the sport (and a few lesser-knowns too) on to his show to gently grill them about their careers and topical issues.
The Rally Report
Sean Choi, who's also a commentator on the National Squash League, welcomes guests from the PSA Tour, with chats spiced up by regular fun features 'Quick Fire' and 'Blind Rankings.'
SportMind
UK-based South African Jesse Engelbrecht brings his expertise as a mental performance coach to the microphone alongside guests from the worlds of pro squash, sports psychology and coaching.
Between the Lines
Former world no.1 Laura Massaro sits alongside ex-pro turned mentor Ahad Raza as they forensically break down the secrets behind their guests' success and offer coaching and fitness tips.
Squash University
Gilly Lane and Jackson Bradman offer regular wrap-ups of the US varsity squash scene, including match previews, reviews and interviews.
Outside the Glass
Now sadly discontinued, it would be remiss not to mention James Zug's collection of 101 excellent interviews which are still available on Spotify and other platforms.
