VIENNA, March 8, 2022 - A legend of German-speaking sports journalism for decades is no longer with us. Dr. Sigi Bergmann died in Klagenfurt at the age of 84.

Bergmann began his journalistic career in the early 1960s at the daily newspaper "Volksblatt". In, 1968 he switched to the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF) as an editor. From 1969 to 1974 he presented the weekly TV program "Sportmosaik". In 1975 he was commissioned to present the legendary format "Sport am Montag", which he designed, moderated and shaped for 17 years - until 1992. In order to show that art and sport are not mutually exclusive, Bergmann brought personalities such as Peter Ustinov, Helmuit Lohner, Otto Schenk and also Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras to his show.

Bergmann was a sports journalist and reporter at a total of 20 Olympic Games, his last was in 2016 in Rio. In addition to football, luge and skiing, he moderated around 4000 boxing matches on ORF, more than any other commentator in the German-speaking world, commenting on all of Muhammad Ali's major fights, whose fan he was. Bergmann worked in the ORF sports department for around 40 years. He is considered a commentator, sports journalist and boxing expert with cult status. Bergmann had been friends since 1967 with the two-time European boxing champion Hans Orsolics, whom he helped lead back to normal life as a promoter and mentor after enormous difficulties.

Sigi has been married 52 years long with Ingeborg and has two daughters. 2016 he became an honorary member of Sports Media Austria and he presented there one of his new books. The Austrian sports journalist family is very sad about this loss.