Power to the people: How the sound of the FA Cup tells stories By Kevin Emmott Monday, November 13, 2023 - 15:41
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Inside the OB sound booth with Shaun Williamson best known as Barry from British soap opera Eastenders at Sheppey FC
We all love an underdog, and the FA Cup is all about the underdog. Established in 1871, the FA Cup is not only the oldest football knockout competition in the world, but is also open to every single club in the English football league system.
It is very special, and not just because of the fixtures but because of the stories. Unlike any other knockout competition, the FA Cup is about giving everyone an equal shot. It is about class as much as it is about football, giving scrappy village teams an opportunity to compete against much bigger clubs, and shining a spotlight on the communities who work tirelessly behind the scenes to make everything happen.
This year more than 700 teams entered, and in November, sound supervisor Max Dighton helped kick off this year's run for ITV when eighth-tier Southern Counties East Football League side Sheppey United took on League Division 2 side Walsall in round one.
In front of a 1,530-capacity crowd at its Holm Park ground on the Isle of Sheppey, the game was so hotly anticipated that the club had to commandeer the Oasis school car park next door for extra parking and had so many people through the turnstiles that it had to ban the sale of chips from the burger bar to reduce waiting times.
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Despite having mixed hundreds of football matches, from Sheppey United right up to the World Cup in Qatar, Dighton is sold on the romance and the storytelling of the FA Cup and the way he approaches the audio presentation reflects that.
It's not just about the game in those early rounds, he says. It's more about telling the stories of the people behind the game. The fans are so excited that you're there; the team are so excited, the club chairman is there to greet you in the OB truck. I've been to FA Cup grounds where the club brings us bacon butties in the morning. You feel like they're letting you into their family.
There is no infrastructure at a club like that, and so our approach to audio is completely dependent on the venue. It's similar to how I used to approach front of house gigs on tour where you have to shape the sound to fit the environment
Crucially, Dighton believes that from an audio perspective, this intimate relationship provides an opportunity to tell a better story. Unlike televised coverage of the higher leagues, it allows a far greater focus on the club itself.
Technically we've got far more access, he says. In these early rounds we typically have access to the club staff who we can bring into the presentation, but at the Isle of Sheppey we were also able to mic up the manager and bring his feed into the commentary during the match. At this stage in the competition the commentary team is able to ask how they think it's going and have a brutally honest conversation as part of the ongoing commentary.
The level of access in these early rounds is brilliant and that's why I like it. There's very little cynicism; everyone is really passionate about their job and it's refreshing to have those personal viewpoints because they provide the viewer with an entirely different perspective.
Right next to the pitch: View from the OB sound booth at Sheppey FC
Infrastructure constraints
Having spent seven years working in live sound at the Tunbridge Wells Forum, Dighton has worked in broadcast sound since 2011. In 2015 he joined Sky, where he spent the next three and a half years mixing live football every single week, including one of the very first live to air Dolby Atmos mixes for the Premiership. When it comes to football he absolutely knows what he's doing, but his approach to capturing the drama of the FA Cup owes as much to his days in live sound as it does to the Premiership.
A few days after the Isle of Sheppey game I was covering Arsenal at the Emirates stadium, says Dighton. The Emirates has a huge patch room that's got video ready to go, with multi and fibre connections already patched so you can quickly get it pitch side or in the studio. None of that exists at the Isle of Sheppey.
There is no infrastructure at a club like that, and so our approach to audio is completely dependent on the venue. It's similar to how I used to approach front of house gigs on tour where you have to shape the sound to fit the environment.
For starters, there is a lot more rigging to be done. The NEP truck was right up on pitchside; as you opened the door to sound, the pitch was right there! It takes two days to physically run all the multi and the fibre cables in, from all around the ground, over toilets and through burger vans.
Meanwhile, the commentary position had to be built on a temporary tower, which is not only next close to the pitch but to the crowd as well, so you have to be aware of the spill of the crowd into the commentary mics.
At smaller grounds, you can hear individual voices, whereas when you're at somewhere like Arsenal, the crowd noise is so much like that classic white noise sound that it almost sounds like a fake effect. But in a smaller ground you can literally hear everyone talking and shouting.
Tailormade mic set up
For this reason, Dighton's microphone approach has to be designed around the venue. At a top flight game there are 12 to 13 mics located around the pitch to enable sound supervisors to follow the ball, but at Sheppey it just was not possible, but nor was it necessary.
At the Isle of Sheppey, we went with eight mics because otherwise you are just getting crowd noise, says Dighton. We used a pair of Sennheiser 416s practically hanging over the pitch to create a st
