The news today is full of the sudden death of Countdown host Richard Whiteley. However what struck me as particularly ironic was that over the weekend Channel 4 has been rerunning one of it’s promotional sequences with stars from many of it’s programmes – including Richard – answering the same question. In this case, the one chosen was “How would you like to be remembered?”.

The answer given by Richard in the sequence is “as the face that launched Channel 4“. However in an interview shown in one of the tributes tonight, he speculates that he’ll more likely be known as the feret man after his now legendary encounter with a ferocious feret on a local news show back in the seventies!

Putting aside the feret, it will be interesting to see what happens with Countdown, the show which over the past 23 years Whiteley has made his own. If they decide to continue, whoever takes over this popular show, they will have a hard act to follow.