As the country's most prominent TV presenter of football, Murray played a major role in the sport's growing popularity in Australia beginning in the 1980s.[3][4] Murray coined the phrase "the world game", which later became the title of SBS's football programme.[citation needed]
He decided to anglicise his name because Ürge was difficult for non-Hungarians to pronounce and made him prone to taunts.[6]: 133 The surname Murray was suggested by his father, as "Muray" is also Hungarian for "of the Mura River".[6]: 134
Murray's passion for football, in which he had been interested from an early age, was sparked after watching a replay of the 1960 European Cup Final. He began work as a journalist in 1971. In between, he found time to perform in a small rock music group, 'The Rubber Band', where he was lead singer. He moved to Network Ten as a commentator in 1977, changing his name from László Ürge to Les Murray at that time.[7]
Murray moved to SBS in 1980 as a Hungarian languagesubtitler but soon turned to covering football. He was the host for SBS coverage of Football including the World Cups from 1986 to 2014, as well as Australia's World Cup Qualifiers, most memorably in 1997, 2001 and 2005. He also anchored the SBS team at friendlies and international tournaments in which junior and women's national teams are competing.
In 2006, Murray stepped down from his position as SBS's Sports Director to become an editorial supervisor for SBS, while his on-air role remained the same. His main motive for this decision was to concentrate on his range of presentation duties as the 'face' of SBS Sport.[9]
On 23 January 2008 Murray was featured in Food Safari episode Hungarian, where he showed Maeve O'Meara how to make rakott krumpli.
In August 2011, Murray won the inaugural 'Blogger of the Year' award at the FFDU Australian Football Media awards,[11] ultimately defeating fellow finalists Matthew Collard and Christian Layland.[12]
In June 2014, he announced his retirement as chief football commentator on SBS, to begin after the FIFA World Cup, although he continued to appear in guest spots on SBS.[2]
On 12 December 2021, Les was posthumously inducted to the Sydney Cricket Ground Media Hall of Honour, alongside 11 others added to the inaugural 15 media personalities who were first celebrated in 2014.[13]
Controversy
In 2011, Murray published a book titled The World Game: The Story of How Football Went Global, in which Murray cited an undisclosed source in alleging that Lucas Neill, the captain of the Socceroos, had instigated a mutiny just before the Germany v Australia game at the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Murray alleged that Neill had asked his coach, Pim Verbeek, to leave the room, before describing Verbeek's game-plan as "bullshit" and erasing what the Dutchman had written on a whiteboard, telling the team to play like they normally do.
The publication of this story was followed by responses from team members who had been eyewitnesses of the actual events, including Craig Moore, Eugene Galeković and Mile Jedinak, stating that the event portrayed in Murray's book never occurred. Neill protested that before the Germany game it was Mark Schwarzer, and not Neill himself, who had given the team pep talk. A few days after the allegations hit the news, Murray retracted his allegations with a full apology, with an undertaking that future editions of his book would have the relevant portion deleted.
The same year then-SBS journalist Jesse Fink accused Murray of conflict of interest at SBS over his Ethics Committee role at FIFA.[14] In 2020, Fink wrote a piece on his website explaining the chronology of his dispute with Murray.[15]
Personal life
Murray was married to Eva, and they had two daughters, Natalie and Tania, before divorcing. He then had a long-term relationship with partner Maria.[16]
Murray appeared with the Australian alternative rock band TISM in their song "What Nationality Is Les Murray?" When the album on which the song appears, Machiavelli and the Four Seasons, won the 1995 ARIA Award for Best Independent Release, Murray accepted the award on the band's behalf with a few lines in his native Hungarian: Amikor eljön a forradalom, a zeneipar lesz az első amely menni fog. Köszönöm szépen. ("When the revolution comes, the music industry will be the first to go. Thank you very much.") The clip of Murray's acceptance of the award can be seen in the video for TISM's "Gold! Gold!! Gold!!!"
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