What is your idea of heaven? For me, it’s pottering in the garden, with a cold beer on the side, the promise of a curry in the evening, and the cricket institution that is the BBC’s Test Match Special as my companion for the day.

It is like having a bunch of friends sat on sun loungers in the corner of the patio talking cricket, but those friends happen to include such cricketing luminaries as Geoffrey Boycott, Michael Vaughan, Henry Blofeld and the ringleader, Jonathan Agnew.

It is understated perfection in a commentary box – genteel and refreshing, fun and informative – all the things that Agnew, or Aggers as the worldwide TMS family prefer to call him, wants it to be.

“The secret of presenting TMS it is that you make listeners feel included,” Aggers, who first took up the TMS microphone in 1991, told me.

Your Local Guardian: Aggers

The view from the commentary box: Not bad, not bad at all

“That is what Brian Johnson did – he was a natural communicator and used various references to letters and cakes that were sent in to help listeners feel part of the show.

“We know that not everyone hangs on our every word. We know it is like background music in the car or when people are decorating.

“All the same, we try to make it sound interesting, otherwise people switch off. And, of course, we need to give accurate descriptions of what is happening.”

TMS started broadcasting in 1957 on BBC Radio 3 – it was the brainchild of Robert Hudson, a BBC broadcaster of the day, who wanted ball by ball coverage of Test matches rather than fixed time slots.

Since then, there have been 21 commentators, and more than 50 summarisers – it is quite some TMS family that has grown over the years.

Aggers said: “There are a whole swathe of different backgrounds and voices that come together. It is a sort of family, and I am not being corny, but that’s why I never want too many people on it.

“Listeners like to know what Victor [Marks] is doing this week or next, and it gets a bit like a soap opera.

“If you get too many people, it can become complicated. You need the right number involved.

“It is odd, people think they know you and, of course, they don’t, but on the radio you are what you are – you cannot pretend to be someone else because you will get found out.”