Ian Davies, for many years head of the World Service Sports Unit, died in December 2004.  These tributes appeared in Ariel:

IAN DAVIES

His many friends at Bush House and elsewhere in the BBC were saddened to hear that Ian Davies, formerly sports editor at the World Service, died just before Christmas aged 71.

Ian's career in sports journalism took him from regional to national newspapers and sports magazines, before his arrival at the World Service.  His forte was cricket, and he covered Test series at home and abroad. He also had a passion for football and, in particular, Northampton Town FC.  Once, when covering an India-Pakistan cricket series in the subcontinent, in the days before the web and email, Ian found himself starved of information about his favourite team. He sent a telegram to the office imploring 'Imperative correspondent informed Cobblerwise'.

He relinquished his role as World Service cricket correspondent to become deputy sports editor and later sports editor of an expanded department.

When he started, Sports Round Up was a 14-minute read by a news announcer, with no inserts, relying heavily on the wire service sports copy which was tied up with elastic bands and dropped two floors down a chute by the newsroom copy-taster. Ian helped to create the busy mix of analysis, on-the-spot reports and interviews of today.

Ian took early retirement in 1990 and moved from south London back to his roots in the Northamptonshire area. Colleagues remember him as a warm, engaging man, whose infectious sense of humour made him excellent company at the Bush House Club and other watering holes. He is survived by his wife June, son Trevor and daughter Sally-Ann.

Martin Fookes

Iain Thomas writes: With the affection for a friend for 40 years, I called Ian 'The Wee Man'. Looking back, the description was wrong. Ian was a big man - not big in height, perhaps big in waistline, certainly big in professionalism and personality.

He could turn his hand or voice to any sports subjects from Olympic Games to covering a Romanian rugby international in Toulouse. Who, among his colleagues or millions of World Service listeners, could forget his powerful one minute report on the change of the laws for downhill skiing?

His personality shone out with kindness, guidance and joviality. His kindness was always there when a friend or workmate needed it. His guidance sent many of today's World Service staff on their career paths and his soothing words lifted many despondent people. His joviality overflowed in the office and on social occasions.

Soon after his army days he married June in 1958 and then launched a career in journalism. Ian loved to tell the tale of an encounter with John Junor, the Sunday Express legendary and forthright Scottish editor.  With largesse, the Express had given every journalist a festive bottle of wine. However the journalists wanted more when they heard of the massive sums being paid to printers for a Christmas holiday shift. The journalists got the reply in a deliberate Scottish accent: 'You got your wine, didn't you?'

Ian had better fortune in an encounter with a World Service executive, one of few who did not admire Ian. He once remarked to me: 'I've got Davies at last. He is to be thrown out of the car park.' Ian parked every day in the courtyard of Bush House in central London, quite a perk. When Ian arrived at the exec's office to hear his fate he produced a doctor's letter to show he needed the parking facility because of a bad knee.  Executive defeated and nobody proved the rumour that Ian had entertained the doctor in a favourite wine bar!

Just two weeks before he died Ian's daughter Sally-Ann drove him to see Northampton win 2-0 at Kidderminster. Aided by wheelchair and portable oxygen it shows how bravely he lived.