Dennis Cometti

Dennis John Cometti (born 26 March 1949) is an Australian retired sports commentator, player and coach of Australian rules football.

In a career spanning 51 years, his smooth voice, dry humour and quick wit became his trademark.

Until his retirement, he remained the only television broadcaster to have spanned the entire duration of the AFL national competition, serving the Seven Network, Nine Network and Broadcom.

His best year in the West Australian Football League was 1968, when he kicked 63 goals playing for West Perth under Graham Farmer.

Farmer wrote, ‘Dennis had just turned 19 and was well over 6 foot with the ability and agility of a co-ordinated rover.

In 1968, Cometti commenced his media career as radio announcer in Perth as a Top-40 disc jockey at radio station 6KY.

Over the following five years, he worked as an announcer on 6PM, 3DB in Melbourne and 6PR, again in Perth.

We thought we had a champion.’ In 1971, Cometti made the senior list at Footscray but, due to injuries and media commitments, was unable to make a mark and did not play a Victorian Football League senior match.

On his return to Perth, he played with some success in the Sunday Football League.

He broadcast his first football match—a state game between Western Australia and Victoria at Subiaco Oval—in 1971.

Melbourne station 3KZ needed a caller, and, due to a quirk of fate, Cometti volunteered to sit alongside Ian Major.

He joined the Australian Broadcasting Commission in 1972 where he concentrated exclusively on sport.

He broadcast his first Test match in 1973 (at 23 the youngest in ABC history) and for the next 13 years broadcast test cricket alongside Alan McGilvray.

He also called WAFL football during his time at the national broadcaster either side of his stint as West Perth coach.

He initially played for Wanneroo before moving to Maddington as captain-coach, leading the club to four successive grand finals and winning successive premierships in 1974, 1975 and 1976.

After retiring as a player, he later coached Osborne Park and Kelmscott, winning a premiership in 1979.

In 1982, Cometti was appointed coach of West Perth.

The club finished third in his first year, but his tenure at West Perth was otherwise uneventful, and the team finished sixth in both 1983 and 1984.

Other than a brief period as chairman of selectors for the Western Australia Australian rules football team, that was Cometti's last active involvement in club football.

In 1986 his move to the Seven Network coincided with the formation of the West Coast Eagles in the VFL.

However, because of a bitter battle over television broadcast rights that excluded the Seven Network, Cometti broadcast the first season of the expanded VFL competition on independent broadcaster Broadcom in all states apart from Victoria.

In 1988, when Seven regained the VFL television rights, Cometti immediately became the highest profile commentator of VFL/AFL matches (based in Western Australia where he presented the evening news sports segment).

In the late 1990s, he was among those to have been sent up by impersonator Andrew Startin on Live And Kicking.

Actor Eric Bana was another to 'do' Cometti.

He also commentated at the Summer Olympics swimming competitions in Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996 and Sydney 2000.

When he retired Cometti had broadcast more Australian Olympic Gold Medals than any other commentator of the television era.

In 1997 Cometti toured South Africa with Drew Morphett covering the three test series on the Seven Network.

He stayed with Seven until 2001 as main sports anchor for Seven News in Perth, when they lost the rights to broadcast AFL matches.

He was succeeded by Basil Zempilas.

Along with his football and news commitments Cometti, with the blessing of Channel 7, broadcast a further 51 test matches for the Packer radio network alongside Henry Blofeld, Richie Benaud, Ian and Greg Chappel and Tony Greig.

Cometti switched to the Nine Network in 2002 and alongside Eddie McGuire, Dermott Brereton and Garry Lyon became the channel's leading Australian rules football caller.

During those five years he was voted Australian Football Media Association (AFMA) television broadcaster of the year five times (career total 11).

Cometti dominated Australia-wide newspaper polls for fan popularity.

He read the sports report on the weeknight National Nine News in Perth.

Occasionally at Nine, he returned to cricket commentary and in 2003/04 called an Australia A game.

With the Seven Network regaining the rights to broadcast AFL games starting from 2007, Cometti re-signed with Seven to call games alongside Bruce McAvaney.

Cometti also had a weekly segment on Seven News in Perth during the AFL season.

He was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the 2019 Australia Day Honours.

Cometti retired as a sports commentator, with his last game being the 2021 AFL Grand Final, which was called for Triple M in Perth on 25 September 2021.

Cometti played 40 matches for West Perth.