Billy Birmingham
Australian comedian and journalist
Billy Birmingham (born 5 July 1953) is an Australian humorist and sometimes sports journalist, most noted for his parodies of Australian cricket commentary in recordings under The Twelfth Man name.
Early career
He wrote the pun-laden comedy hit "Australiana", which was made famous by performer Austen Tayshus and reached No. 1, ultimately becoming the most successful single on the Australian charts in 1983.
The Twelfth Man
In 1984 he released his first record as The Twelfth Man, titled "It's Just Not Cricket". This went on to become his most successful series of recordings, with eight albums being released between 1987 and 2006. The premise involved Birmingham impersonating and satirizing the Channel Nine cricket commentary team, particularly Richie Benaud, Bill Lawry and Tony Greig.
During the Sydney 2000 Olympics, Birmingham also recorded a series of mock-commentaries on Olympic events as the Wired World of Sports, featuring such characters as the American track-and-field representative "Chuck DeWobblee" ("chucked a wobbly" – meaning to throw a tantrum) and the Ukrainian pole-vaulter "Olga Bedjanodgonnagedova" ("bet you're not gonna get over"), while also releasing the single under the 12th Man name, "Bruce 2000", featuring an impersonation of famed commentator Bruce McAvaney during the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games.
Birmingham has commented on his relationship with Richie Benaud, stating that he was kind when meeting with him, but a problem he had with his albums was the amount of obscenities he used when impersonating him, and that he thought it didn't reflect him personally. He has also stated that his favorite person to impersonate was Richie Benaud, as well as stating that over the years that things associated with the 12th Man have become conflated with Richie Benaud. Specifically, the 12th Man's interpretation of Benaud's Two for twenty two phrase, saying that Benaud never said that—apart from when it was the score.
“Billy Birmingham” enters the record as australian comedian and journalist. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Billy, Birmingham and Australian can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q16185260. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1953, 1983, 1984 and 1987.
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This entry incorporates text from “Billy Birmingham” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.