Telemundo's Sammy Sadovnik reveals his secret to gol calls
World Soccer Talk had the opportunity to interview Telemundo World Cup commentator Sammy Sadovnik. Currently, Sadovnik is stationed in Doha with the rest of Telemundo’s on-air talent.
Like most play-by-play voices out in Qatar, the World Cup is the busiest possible schedule. For example, Sadovnik called games virtually every day. The two-day break between the round of 16 and the quarterfinals was his first time off since getting to Qatar. While there, he witnessed a number of great moments.
Sadovnik is one of the Spanish-language broadcasters to use the lengthy ‘goooool’ calls when one team scores. For reference, he once chanted that famous word for 17-consecutive seconds following a goal. However, duration is one thing. It is the emotion that truly speaks through his voice.
Sadovnik called that Argentina-Poland game on Telemundo. Also, he did the Japan-Croatia round of 16 clash. He was the voice for Ivan Perišić’s header that leveled the game in the second half.
In the near future, he is on the call for a quarterfinal tie between Brazil and Croatia, as well as the third-place match of the tournament.
Sammy Sadovnik Interview
In this exclusive World Soccer Talk interview, Sammy Sadovnik talks about the mental and physical preparations required to call games. With such a high number of games in a short time span, there is certainly wear on the vocal cords.
Beyond that, however, is the emotion involved in calls. Sadovnik sees himself as a pathway to get the emotion of the stadium into the millions of households watching in the United States. Telemundo and other Spanish-language broadcasters do this brilliantly. The high-energy back and forth between the commentary team provides an understanding for the potentially frenetic nature of the game as it happens.
Even if you do not speak Spanish, watching Telemundo, and Sadovnik’s commentary, allows viewers to fully understand what the World Cup means.