Adrian Barich: Rick Ardon and Susannah Carr have built a legendary partnership over 40 years at Seven

A special wedding edition of this magazine is a good chance for me to talk about an on-air partnership which is a lot like a marriage — full of mutual respect, occasional eye rolls and the knowledge that, at some point, one of them will inevitably have to finish the other’s sentence.

I think you know who I may be talking about: Rick Ardon and Susannah Carr are entering their 40th year reading the Seven news together and having sat next to them at least 1000 times, I’m in the perfect position to pass comment.

But just in case I needed further input, I’ve consulted with Basil Zempilas who teamed up with the dynamic duo on more than 5000 occasions, and Jeff Newman, who was, for many, many years, also synonymous with this extraordinary duo.

To take the marriage analogy a bit further, there’s a lot of teamwork that goes on with the odd bit of chaos, where working in harmony becomes the key to delivering a seamless news bulletin — along with the shared knowledge that all couples look better if they just agree to smile at the same time.

Then there’s the unspoken rule that if there is a technical hiccup, the best way to deal with it is to pretend it never happened . . . and look fabulous doing it.

It’s all about constant collaboration, a bit of silent competition, and the shared hope that the other person (or maybe the sports presenter) doesn’t accidentally say something that could end up as a viral meme.

To give you some insight on how much Rick and Sue care about their job, whoever gets dressed for the news first sets the “colour” scheme for that night. Check out how often Sue’s jacket matches Rick’s tie, and vice versa, at 6pm.

The strength of the combination rivals the best partnerships this State has ever seen. From our perspective, they should be mentioned in the same breath as legendary cricket duo Lillee and Marsh.

And honestly, their example has even given someone like me — a bit of an uncouth ex-footballer — the chance to gain some credibility. Reflected glory, I would call it, for want of a better description. Even Basil admits a lot of his success wouldn’t have happened without Rick and Sue’s magic dust spreading across the news desk.

Incredibly, although many rivals have tried to knock them off over those four decades, they’ve remained the number one team in the west.

Even the Beatles only held the top spot for a total of 132 weeks across their career.

Rick and Sue’s “marriage” has endured through all the fast-paced changes in the industry, and over the entire journey they’ve stayed perfectly in sync. No cold shoulders or silent treatment here — just pure, uninterrupted harmony on screen.

And on a personal note, I’ve had the pleasure of bonding with Susannah over our love of dogs. She doted on Poppy, her adorable miniature wire-haired dachshund, while I was always the proud parent of pugs. We’d often chat behind the scenes about their antics —Sue shared stories of Poppy’s little adventures, and I’d regale her with tales about Bean, my naughty pug.

It is those small, shared moments that make working with Sue such a joy. Despite the glamour of the screen, she is incredibly down- to-earth and genuinely warm, even after years in the spotlight. Whilst some of us who will go unnamed may have believed our face was our passport, Rick and Sue have no such thoughts.

In fact, it’s the complete lack of any controversial moments and their impartiality that is part of their unique charm. Whilst many, particularly in my world of sport, have occasionally made front-page news, Rick and Sue have been incredibly disciplined.

A lot of positive stuff has happened behind the scenes, though; mostly, that is never really mentioned. For example, one day Rick asked me to accompany him to the home of a viewer who was doing it tough to help celebrate the fella’s birthday. Fair enough, I thought, and off we went to his house, which was in a pretty tough area. Rick’s wife Erin was already there with a birthday cake and candles. The old man was very moved, to say the least. As he blew out the candles from his wheelchair, I thought, “wow, that’s special”.