James Brayshaw


James Antony Brayshaw is an Australian media personality working in television for the Seven Network and radio for Triple M and a retired cricketer. For Seven Sport he hosts and calls Test cricket during summer and Australian Football League on Saturday nights during winter.
Brayshaw worked for the Nine Network for 15 years, calling AFL, cricket and co-hosting The Footy Show.
As a cricketer he was known as Jamie Brayshaw. He is a former chairman of the North Melbourne Football Club. From 2011 to 2015 he was chairman of the Melbourne Renegades cricket team.
Brayshaw is the son of former Western Australian cricketer and Australian rules footballer Ian Brayshaw and the brother of Mark Brayshaw, a former player for the AFL club North Melbourne.
As of December 2018, Brayshaw has three nephews on AFL Lists at three clubs; Angus Brayshaw at the Melbourne Football Club. Andrew Brayshaw at the Fremantle Football Club and Hamish Brayshaw at the West Coast Eagles Football Club. Mark Brayshaw is father of Angus, Andrew and Hamish.

Cricket career

Playing for South Australia and Western Australia, Brayshaw had a career spanning almost a decade. In that time he was a consistent fielder, with 43 catches. Not only is he a two-time Sheffield Shield winner, this achievement was completed with two states and occurred on the teams' respective home grounds. In the 1987/1988 final, Brayshaw won with Western Australia at the WACA Ground and in the 1995/1996 final he won with South Australia at the Adelaide Oval. He would continue to play domestic cricket for one more season, before retiring at 30 years of age.
Playing in the 1995/1996 Sheffield Shield final at the Adelaide Oval, Brayshaw performed solidly with the bat, scoring 87 in the first innings and 66 in the second innings. Both teams fielded high quality players who have represented Australia at various levels. Some would go on to coach at state and national levels. West Australia fielded players including Michael Hussey, Justin Langer, Tom Moody, Damien Martyn, Adam Gilchrist, Jo Angel, Brad Hogg and Brendon Julian. While South Australia fielded players including Greg Blewett, Darren Lehmann, Tim Neilsen, Tim May and Jason Gillespie. The match ended in a draw, with a respectable performance from Adam Gilchrist 189 in the first innings, and as a consequence James and his South Australian teammates were the 1995/1996 Sheffield Shield premiers.
Brayshaw also played in the 1987/1988 Sheffield Shield win for West Australia, but his performance with the bat was less successful. Scoring 24 off 104 balls and 4 off 8 balls and having the rare achievement of being caught by two international test captains, with Allan Border in the first innings and Ian Botham in the second innings

Media career

Early career

In the 1990s, Brayshaw worked for the Seven Network in Adelaide. This included being a substitute sports anchor for the Seven Nightly News bulletin and working on local football discussion programs, such as Footy Plus. In early 1998 he was teamed up with Amanda Blair and Paul Gale on Adelaide's SAFM, which eventually became that city's number one rating breakfast show. One on-air incident at SAFM saw him covered in Adelaide Football Club bodypaint after the club he supports, North Melbourne, lost the 1998 AFL Grand Final to them.

2000s

In 2001 his big break came as the host of the Seven Network's Ashes action with Jeff Thomson, but later moved to the Nine Network when the Australian Football League was transferred. He became the nightly anchor for the National Nine News sport report, as well as contributing to other sports programs on the network, eventually becoming a regular commentator in both football and cricket coverage. In 2005, Brayshaw co-hosted Any Given Sunday with Garry Lyon and Sam Newman.
In 2006, Brayshaw replaced Eddie McGuire as host of The AFL Footy Show, a position he held until the end of 2016. Additionally, with Lyon he co-hosted the morning sessions of the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne. Apart from his television commitments, he works for radio station Triple M, as a host and commentator of their Australian rules football coverage. He also worked as a full-time co-host on breakfast program The Cage before it was axed in 2007 and replaced with Pete & Myf. Previously he has been part of the Melbourne-based show via his home studio in the Adelaide Hills.
Brayshaw was installed as chairman of the North Melbourne Football Club on 6 December 2007 after the club rejected the AFL's deal to permanently relocate to the Gold Coast.
In September 2007, Brayshaw announced that he was leaving The Cage to spend more time with his family – just before the program was cancelled due to high costs and poor ratings.

Channel 9 years

Brayshaw also hosted The Sunday Footy Show, alongside panelists Dermott Brereton, Nathan Brown, Shane Crawford and Billy Brownless. He has also hosted the Australian version of Wipeout with Josh Lawson.
For the duration of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, Brayshaw took on a commentary role for various skiing events alongside Michael Kennedy, former international moguls skier, dual Winter Olympics coach and current CEO of Ski & Snowboard Australia, in calling the moguls competition. Brayshaw teamed up with three-time Australian snowboard champion, Jay Onley, to call the action from the Olympic snowboard competition.
In 2011, Brayshaw resigned from The Sunday Footy Show and was replaced by fellow ex-cricketer Simon O'Donnell. In addition, he commentated on events of the 2012 London Olympics of which Nine had broadcast rights with Foxtel.
Brayshaw has also been involved in golf and cricket coverage for Nine.
In December 2016, it was announced that Brayshaw had left the Nine Network after contract negotiations broke down.

Seven Network

In February 2018, it was announced that Brayshaw would join the Seven Network as an AFL commentator to call Saturday night matches for the network. In July 2018, it was announced that Brayshaw would host and commentate for Seven Sport's coverage of Test cricket and the Big Bash League.
In addition to his work with Seven, Brayshaw currently co-hosts The Rush Hour on Triple M Melbourne with Billy Brownless. The show is broadcast weekdays in the drive-time slot. He also hosts Triple M's Saturday afternoon football program The Saturday Rub and calls Saturday afternoon football for the station subject to his commitments with Channel 7. Formerly he also contributed to Triple M's coverage of test cricket.

Personal life

In an accident on 20 September 2006, his sister Sally was killed instantly after the facade of her garage collapsed on top of her.
Brayshaw and his wife Sarah have four sons. On 23 October 2014, the couple announced their separation after 23 years of marriage.