Vale: Rob Astbury

Former sports broadcaster Rob Astbury, best known for roles at TEN and Nine, has died aged 69.

He died at home on the Gold Coast, according to reports.

After an early career in Melbourne radio, Astbury made a jump to television — firstly for TEN before accepting an offer to work for Nine. During a 21-year media career, he won 10 VFL / AFL awards, two national Penguin awards and was twice nominated for the Logie Awards for the Best News Story of the year.

But he hit the headlines in 2006 when celebrity agent Anthony Zammit published Astbury’s biography King and I: My Life with Graham Kennedy. It detailed Astbury’s relationship with the late king of comedy. That same year he revealed he was HIV positive.

After retiring from television, he worked as a real estate agent between 1994 and 2000. For the next decade he ran a property development company in Thailand, filing on the tsunami for Crikey. He returned to the Gold Coast in 2010 to continue in real estate.

Who better to rapidly sum up Rob Astbury’s life than the man himself. So here are the last few paragraphs of Rob’s unpublished memoir. Yes it names names & settles scores but it’s a lot more than just that. pic.twitter.com/bDMBIa9TtD

— Peter Ford (@mrpford) November 10, 2017

Source: RealEstate.com.au,