It's A Knockout saw out the 1970s still in excellent shape. With the series taking in the domestic heats, celebrity, championship, international and Christmas broadcasts, It's A Knockout featured in the 1979 schedules for nearly five months of the year. The triumvirate of Stuart Hall, Eddie Waring and Arthur Ellis were all still at the top of their game and the audiences continued to be encouraging - the 1980 International Final was, for instance, seen by 110 million viewers across Europe. However, new decades often bring sweeping changes - out with the old, in with the new and all that, and if we're honest, with the dawn of the 1980s, the writing was on the wall for the series.

The announcement of the 1980 series itself gave regular viewers a slight cause for concern. From 1975-79, the series had been given a full one-hour slot on BBC1. The 1980 series would see that time whittled back to fifty minutes. The series would remain in this format until 1982 - when it was completely whittled away by BBC1 Controller, Alan Hart, who was not among the series' fans. As with many older properties, you got the feeling with the BBC that series such as It's A Knockout were only kept going out of habit, and even then grudgingly so with little support from management as they were felt to be "old hat". This view was reinforced by critics, anxious for something to lay in to and the BBC, in time honoured fashion, paid more attention to the critics than to audiences who patently still loved the innocent fun of it all.

It could be said though that 1980 was the last genuinely vintage series of It's A Knockout, where all the elements came together and everyone was on top form. The crux of the matter was Eddie Waring's health, which clearly took a knock between the 1980 and 1981 series. 1980 saw his traditional witty rejoinders with long-time colleague, Stuart Hall, and his usual colourful descriptions of the marathons, but in 1981, he was clearly not up to speed. And it was painful to watch. The much-loved Waring sounded confused, out of his depth and not totally cognisant of what he was commentating on. He still managed the odd clever comeback at Hall, but they were few and far between... At 71, Eddie Waring was suddenly going to have to succumb to an inevitable slowing down, and this cast a pall over the series. Eddie saw out the 1981 series determinedly, but it was to be his last. He retired from the series and from his beloved Rugby League commentary job (also with the BBC) and lived out his last years in his native Yorkshire. He died in October 1986, aged 76. His role would be filled by a succession of 'C-list' celebrities in the 1982 series, including actors and actresses from several BBC programmes of the time, such as Hi-De-Hi!, Blue Peter and Last of the Summer Wine. Frazer Hines from Yorkshire TV's Emmerdale Farm and the BBC's long-running series, Doctor Who and Brian Cant from Play Away were probably the nearest the 1982 series came to making a decent job of replacing dear Eddie. And don't even remind me of the nadir of 1982, when that desperately unfunny 'comedy' duo, The Krankies stepped into Eddie Waring's shoes. Never was a greater insult paid to the King of Dewsbury...

So, the triumvirate - together for ten memorable seasons of It's A Knockout - was broken, its chemistry consigned to memory - and, fortunately, videotape. The series' days were numbered in any case, with all the European broadcasters involved in Jeux Sans Frontières agreeing shortly afterwards that 1982 would be the final year of the competition. Escalating costs were becoming simply too much to bear. This meant the BBC effectively had nowhere to go with It's A Knockout, it being perceived by this time as essentially a qualifier-series for the international competition, so 1982 would see the end of the domestic competition too. The BBC continued with the occasional special, at Christmas or just for the hell of it, but they ended up as little more than nostalgic one-off returns with no chance of a series.

The domestic events of the early Eighties must rank among the most impressive of the whole British domestic series, thanks to a greater emphasis upon creating high-quality costumes for the events and to the continued genius of games deviser and designer, Stuart Furber. Highlights were definitely the Wasbees (pictured, left) - larger than life half-wasp, half bees with springy antennae and a sting on the snout for bursting balloons - the Budgies, a succession of giants, chefs and many other creations brightened up the weeknights of the annual British transition between a dull, windy and wet Spring and a slightly brighter, windy and wet Summer. Also of note were the myriad costumes in which Stuart Hall would find himself bedecked each week (see picture, top right for one of his colourful attires). They fitted in perfectly with the atmosphere of It's A Knockout as he strutted around the town squares and parks of Newark, Sherborne, Whitby and the like, Knockout's ultimate showman.

Even though It's A Knockout found itself in its twilight years, the standard of competition was just as strong as ever. Contests were always keenly fought, with some extremely close finishes. Teams that won through to the international stages of the competition performed well, particularly Rhuddlan, second in the International Final 1980 and Dartmouth, who achieved a joint-First Place in the following final. Much was expected of Charnwood in 1982, who were unbeaten in the domestic events, winning their heat against Rutland and Melton Mowbray and then emerging victorious from the Championship Knockout (along with West Dorset, who tied with them on 40 points) beating five other teams in the process. Charnwood appeared in the first Jeux Sans Frontières of 1982 from La Maddelena, Italy - and they won that event convincingly, too, qualifying them for the International Final. Unfortunately, it was there that their luck ran out. Charnwood finished a disappointing 5th. It was certainly a case of what might have been. It was Britain's last appearance in Jeux Sans Frontières, and the pressure got to the lads and lasses from Leicestershire.

But sometimes things never go to plan. The BBC themselves found similar problems with the first of their It's A Knockout specials following the series. You can read more about this in the next article in this sequence, Revisitations.

by Alan Hayes