Gary Lineker: The Private Battles Behind a Public Life

What happens when you stop seeing your hardest tests as failures and begin to see them as a life well lived? In this episode of Begin Again, Gary Lineker joins Davina McCall for a deeply personal conversation about fatherhood, relationships, football, leaving the BBC and learning to embrace change. Gary opens up about the terrifying moment his son George was diagnosed with leukaemia at just six weeks old, the fear his family lived with during seven months at Great Ormond Street Hospital, and why they “could never relax” even after returning home. He also reflects on his two marriages and challenges the idea that divorce means failure. Gary reveals why he considers both marriages a success, how he has remained close to his ex-wives, and why, after years of being single, he has become comfortable with his own company, while remaining open to finding love again. After 30 years at the BBC and 25 years presenting Match of the Day, Gary shares what it feels like to step into a new chapter, why life outside the BBC means no longer “treading on eggshells”, and how he built Goalhanger into a hugely successful podcast business. From his father quietly believing in his football talent to becoming a dad himself, this is a warm and moving conversation about family, divorce, love, resilience, career change and finding the courage to begin again. 🌟Like, comment and subscribe for more honest conversations about purpose, resilience, love, loss and beginning again. Follow us here: 📸www.instagram.com/beginagain 🎥https://www.tiktok.com/@beginagainpod ✨Sign up for the Begin Again newsletter for behind-the-scenes access, recommendations and much more: https://linkly.link/2g2xm Follow Gary here: https://www.instagram.com/garylineker/?hl=en We'd love you to share your Get Busy Living stories with us at https://getbusyliving.beginagainshow.com/ (00:00) Intro (01:28) Gary’s Latest TV Show (05:35) How Gary Built Goalhanger From the Ground Up (10:56) Gary’s Son George’s Battle With Leukemia (18:35) Monzo GBL Ad (20:06) How Gary’s Childhood Led Him to Football (23:19) How Harry Kane Broke Gary’s Record (24:50) Why Gary Ended His Football Career (29:35) Monzo 90 Days Ad (30:42) How Gary Made the Leap Into TV (36:05) How Gary Became the Face of Match of the Day (39:57) Why Gary Left the BBC for Netflix (42:18) What Gary Really Thinks of England’s World Cup Performance (45:09) Why Gary Wants the Super-Rich to Pay More Tax (47:11) How Two Marriages and Divorces Played Out in the Public Eye (51:34) Why Gary Is Still Single Download Monzo. Monzo Current Accounts are for 16+ and UK residents. Ts&Cs Apply. Join the 'Say Yes Club' and hear more about our events here - https://events.beginagainshow.com/ Mastercard's exchange rate applies. Monzo Current Accounts are for 16+ and UK residents. Ts&Cs Apply Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:31Speaker 01

  Davina and Lineker, who linked up so well for Begin Again.

• 0:36Speaker 01

  Gary Lineker has etched his trademark.

• 0:42Speaker 01

  And Gary Lineker, relishing the service. That one was a gift, but he was there. Superbly done. Lineker! The chances today are all ending up in the back of the net. Lineker! And Gary Lineker has pounced, and now the England supporters are making themselves heard.

• 1:08Speaker 02

  Gary's coming home.

• 1:19Speaker 02

  This is so exciting. So first of all, I just want to let you know, Gary Lineker, man of the people. See, you've got a taxi, you forget the man of the people, he's not at all.

• 1:31Speaker 02

  Look, he's giving a tip. Man of the people, I take that back.

• 1:35Speaker 03

  Hello, you. Get up, get up, get up.

• 1:38Speaker 02

  Gary.

• 1:41Speaker 03

  It's you. I know. I know I am.

• 1:44Speaker 02

  Gary.

• 1:45Speaker 03

  I'm not that big now.

• 1:46Speaker 02

  So excited.

• 1:47Speaker 03

  That's you.

• 1:48Speaker 02

  Come on, Gary.

• 1:58Speaker 02

  I'm quite excited, can you tell?

• 2:01Speaker 03

  You seem a little bit excited.

• 2:03Speaker 02

  It's just that I've known you forever.

• 2:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 2:06Speaker 02

  But I don't know you. Do you know what I mean?

• 2:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's a public eye thing, isn't it?

• 2:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:11Speaker 03

  We have met occasionally over the years, yeah.

• 2:14Speaker 02

  We've done various shows together. And we saw each other at the NTAs last year, which was brilliant. But it's an honour to have you here. I think for somebody to still be relevant in the public eye after such a long and illustrious career is worth celebrating.

• 2:32Speaker 03

  Well, thank you.

• 2:33Speaker 02

  And well done.

• 2:34Speaker 03

  Likewise.

• 2:35Speaker 02

  Still here, we're still here.

• 2:36Speaker 03

  Still going, still punching.

• 2:39Speaker 02

  So I'd like to talk to you first off, because you've got this new show on ITV. And I was a bit like, you know, how many, how many ideas can there be for TV? How unique can it be? Oh my god, I got presenters envy.

• 2:53Speaker 03

  Did you?

• 2:54Speaker 02

  It's so good!

• 2:56Speaker 03

  It's a lot of fun.

• 2:58Speaker 02

  So tell us a bit about it, it's on ITV.

• 3:00Speaker 03

  It's on ITV, it'll be coming in September, early September, I think, and...

• 3:04Speaker 02

  What day, what time?

• 3:06Speaker 03

  Saturdays and Sundays for four weeks.

• 3:10Speaker 03

  Primetime, of course, I mean...

• 3:11Speaker 02

  Obviously, this is Gary Lineker, obviously, come on.

• 3:14Speaker 03

  We do anything but primetime, aren't we?

• 3:16Speaker 02

  And you don't have to do anything, except for enjoy it. I'm so jealous.

• 3:20Speaker 03

  That's very true. It's, it's a bit, it's, it's watching people mostly have fun, but also face their fears and, and all sorts of different challenges. So it's basically, we've got 10 celebrities and these 10 big yellow boxes, a bit like telephone boxes, but you can't see out of them. So they wield these trucks around, these, these boxes around the country, and the celebrities inside the box don't know when the box opens, where they are, what they're about to face, and it could be anything. And I don't want to give, obviously, too much away to people, because part of the surprise is, is mostly the, the fun of the show, but some of the challenges are, you know, you know the I360 at Brighton, for example?

• 4:05Speaker 03

  We managed to get one of them on top of that in the, in the sky, and they walk out and it's like, wow, what have I got to do? And there's also a challenge after that. So, you know, there's, there's, they, they come out of the boxes, they're in the, in front of a Butlins crowd, and all sorts of... Yeah, I won't tell all of them, but, but they, they really went for it, and...

• 4:28Speaker 02

  I mean, this is the kind of show you have to throw yourself into, I think, as a celebrity.

• 4:32Speaker 03

  Definitely.

• 4:33Speaker 02

  They are, they are having to take themselves out of their comfort zones. And they're usually used to public arenas, but this is next level, what you put them through.

• 4:43Speaker 03

  Well, some, some of them, some, and some of them are actually just a bit of fun, or some of them are actually a little bit thoughtful, they've got to work themselves through something. So it's not all horrible, but there's always a degree of the fear of the unknown as they step out of the box. I had a lot of, it was something totally different, I hadn't really done anything like that before. I've obviously hosted shows outside of football, but, but something like this was sort of gamey reality show.

• 5:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:13Speaker 03

  Was different. I mean, you've done lots of...

• 5:15Speaker 02

  And it's, it's a huge, it's on such a huge scale, and you are having to think out of the box.

• 5:26Speaker 03

  Indeed, very good, boom.

• 5:30Speaker 02

  Do you want me to write for you?

• 5:31Speaker 03

  You could, you could do...

• 5:32Speaker 02

  I mean, there are a million puns, right? So many puns.

• 5:35Speaker 03

  You should do a lot of presenting with that kind of skill.

• 5:37Speaker 02

  You should try presenting, have a go at that. I mean, you've had such a varied career, because this is, you're, you're in your 60s now, and you are presenting like a mega entertainment TV programme. That's so inspiring for other people, I think, as, as we age, to see you living your best life.

• 6:01Speaker 03

  It's still possible, as pensioners, we can still soldier on.

• 6:05Speaker 02

  I'd like to talk to you as well about Goalhanger. Am I right in saying that? You set up that business like 12 years ago.

• 6:10Speaker 03

  About that, it was originally a sports production business with my partner, Tony Pastor, who I always stayed in touch with, used to work together at the BBC a long time ago. And then he was headhunted by ITV to run football there, to be head of football. So he did that for many years, but we all stayed in touch, and then we, we met one day and, and talked about doing something together. He'd already started on his own doing a production company, but we, we joined, we made lots of sports docs, we did, you know, Rooney, Kevin Peterson, Anthony Joshua, did three with him.

• 6:46Speaker 02

  You did three documentaries with Anthony Joshua?

• 6:48Speaker 03

  Anthony Joshua, yeah.

• 6:49Speaker 02

  Did you?

• 6:49Speaker 03

  Yeah, back about 11 years ago, 10 years ago, yeah. When he was making his name. So we did a few of those, and then, and then we discovered podcasts. I did, I did a podcast because we thought, what is this podcast? Shall we do one? And we're going, hmm, yeah, maybe. So we thought we'd do something. I did something with Danny Baker called Behind Closed Doors, like footballer meets football fan. And Danny's, you know, really funny.

• 7:16Speaker 02

  He's so funny.

• 7:17Speaker 03

  And it did okay, and we thought, we got a book deal, and it was very early days of podcasting. We thought there might be something in this. And then, then we'd always done sport, though, and then Tony was in a bookshop, and he was, he's a big World War II fussy, you know, and he was looking for a book on World War II, and he's, he called me, he said, the top four books, four of the books in the top 10 are about World War II. I went, oh, great, because I'm not really a fust about World War II, but, so I said, oh, great, and he said, so I thought I'd look for a podcast and I can't find one. I went, oh, that's a shame. And he went, shall we do one? I went, what, on World War II? I said, we've only ever done sport. And, and in the end, we, we did, we did with Al Murray, the comedian, who's a massive

• 8:01Speaker 03

  World War II aficionado, and, and his friend James Holland. And, and it proved really quite popular. It's a niche subject, but it does really well, and we have a World War II festival every year now, yeah, for that podcast, yeah. And then from there...

• 8:18Speaker 02

  And in terms of...

• 8:19Speaker 03

  We went from James Holland to Tom Holland.

• 8:20Speaker 02

  At school?

• 8:21Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 8:22Speaker 02

  As well as so interesting, sorry, James Holland to Tom Holland.

• 8:24Speaker 03

  So James Holland said, Tom, his brother, wants to do one on all history, and then it took, took a while to get his partner. And in the end, we said, well, historian mates, who do you want to be with when you're in the pub? He went, well, Dominic Sandbrook. So you could say The Rest Is History, but you know I've used that one a few times before.

• 8:42Speaker 02

  But The Rest Is is such a brilliant precursor to anything.

• 8:46Speaker 03

  In the end, it is, and it's quite interesting, because we, we ummed and ahhed about whether to use it.

• 8:52Speaker 02

  Again.

• 8:53Speaker 03

  Again, because The Rest Is History is obvious, because it's actually a phrase. Whereas after that, we, the next one we did was, was politics. And there were only about four of us in the office back then, and we, it's sort of, we were all, shall we do it with The Rest Is Politics? Because it doesn't really make sense, but can we build a brand? And we went with the brand idea and, and proved to be good, yeah.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  I mean, it really works, and you know that they're all from the same stable, you know what you're going to get, you've built something you can trust, I think it's...

• 9:23Speaker 03

  I hope so.

• 9:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's really, really good.

• 9:26Speaker 03

  No, I'm really proud, really proud of what we've, we've built out of nowhere, but it, it didn't, didn't come about by accident, but it was, it wasn't a, like, preconceived plan to build this podcast empire, yeah.

• 9:36Speaker 02

  What's up your sleeve for The Rest Is?

• 9:39Speaker 03

  Up my sleeve? Well, we've been looking for a while at things like food and how you can do food, because obviously food's very visual, and, and, but having said that, the podcast world now, as we can see here, everything is now filming.

• 9:54Speaker 02

  It is incredible, it's like a TV show.

• 9:55Speaker 03

  And we've, we've obviously gone down that route as well. So food's impossible, and we're looking at one about power. And also, and also true crime is a possibility. But there's nothing absolutely immediate at the, at present, but there, there's a couple trying, we're doing a few tryouts and things like that, but...

• 10:19Speaker 02

  I like going clubbing, so if you could do The Rest Is Raving, that would be great.

• 10:23Speaker 03

  The Rest Is Raving.

• 10:25Speaker 02

  Whoop, whoop, it's just been me in a club.

• 10:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, just do that.

• 10:27Speaker 02

  I'll have a really good time!

• 10:28Speaker 03

  It'll be all right for about three episodes.

• 10:30Speaker 02

  Thanks, Gary!

• 10:31Speaker 03

  After that, after that, I think you might run out of something to talk about.

• 10:35Speaker 02

  I won't be talking, I'll just be dancing.

• 10:36Speaker 03

  Oh, okay.

• 10:37Speaker 02

  A great telly. I think it's, not only is it a good brand, but it's also been such a massive success. I mean, it was something like 371% like increase...

• 10:52Speaker 03

  It's, as a business, it's been incredible.

• 10:55Speaker 02

  It's just been nuts, right? I mean, you were talking about four of you in the office, how many are you now?

• 10:59Speaker 03

  I think we're closing in on 100. And uh but it's lovely, you know, we got, I go in the office and there's, it's just such a really young people, we're employing young people, they're enjoying it, really diverse, um, super intelligent young people, who are really enjoying their job and that gives us so much satisfaction, it's great.

• 11:21Speaker 02

  Like, it's lovely to be around young people, it helps.

• 11:23Speaker 03

  It does, definitely does.

• 11:25Speaker 02

  Young.

• 11:26Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:26Speaker 02

  Gary, you've got four boys.

• 11:28Speaker 03

  Yeah, I know.

• 11:28Speaker 02

  Michelle and you had four beautiful boys. How do they keep you grounded?

• 11:35Speaker 03

  Quite easily by taking a piss out of me most of the time.

• 11:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's what I mean, like, what do they do?

• 11:39Speaker 03

  Oh, I don't know, they, they get, they, they don't appreciate my dad jokes, they rip me for that.

• 11:46Speaker 02

  You dad joke guy?

• 11:47Speaker 03

  I love dad jokes, I'm, it's almost like it's compulsive. I'm not actually telling the jokes, but it will always be like a ridiculous pun about, there will be one before the end of the.

• 11:56Speaker 02

  Good, okay, I'll look forward to that. Oh, I'd like to talk in fact about, um, you and Michelle, you had your boys and I know that George, um, when he was quite young, he got, was it leukemia?

• 12:08Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 12:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, very young.

• 12:10Speaker 02

  And he was very, very poorly.

• 12:12Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 12:13Speaker 02

  But you were at the height of your football career and, you know, a dad, and with Michelle, like, how did you cope with that?

• 12:25Speaker 03

  Well, we both coped with it differently, um.

• 12:30Speaker 03

  Michelle's more spiritual than I am, I'm kind of atheist, I don't believe in any of that, so, um. So we dealt with it in a, in different ways.

• 12:39Speaker 02

  Was that difficult?

• 12:40Speaker 03

  Um, not really, no, because it was equally difficult for both of us. So, um, I mean, he was, he was about six years, only six weeks old, six weeks old.

• 12:50Speaker 02

  I mean.

• 12:51Speaker 03

  And he had, he had this.

• 12:52Speaker 02

  So vulnerable.

• 12:53Speaker 03

  Uh, it's not, it's just, he had this little bump on his head and we thought, it's a bit odd, but it was, it wasn't just a bump, it was like really hard.

• 13:00Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 13:01Speaker 03

  So we thought, I will take him in to see, get it checked and they looked at it, they said, oh, it looks like this kind of, um, skin condition that, um, we'll take a, take a little biopsy and we'll report back in about 10 days, so. So we went, we went home, blah, blah, blah, 10 days goes on. He's now got lots of the bumps all over his head, his like, his head was a bit like a golf ball. Um, and it was really weird, so we were obviously worried, so we went back to the, and there were two doctors in there. And, and they said, well, first thing, it does look like it's this skin condition. It's come back, so we thought, so well, that's a relief, like, so, and then I said, well, I said,

• 13:44Speaker 03

  I said, you say that, but, you know, he's, the last two, three days, he really does appear quite unwell. And it, his glands are up a little bit under his arms and.

• 13:53Speaker 02

  Feel that.

• 13:53Speaker 03

  I could feel that in his groins and, and they, they said, oh, okay. So they went, let's have a look, so they took his, his little outfit off and he took his nappy off. And they've started fooling around and I, I'll never forget it, they just, I mean, they just looked at each other.

• 14:10Speaker 03

  And they went, Mr. And Mrs. Lineker, I'm, I'm, I'm really sorry, but this, this does appear to be something much more serious. It was like, what, what do you mean? So, so well, we need to do some tests, obviously, but it, this does look like leukemia, so we've gone. I mean, yeah, it was just like being whacked. And then, and so I knew, I knew leukemia was a blood cancer, but I didn't know anything else really at that point in my life. So I said, well, wha- wha- what does that mean? So, well, we need to do some tests, the first thing, he's clearly very unwell, we need to get him, and within an hour, in Great Ormond Street, and where, where he spent the next seven months.

• 14:55Speaker 03

  Um, and it was, it was so, it was, it was hard. Um, and also being in the public high made it sometime, you know, most of the time in life, it's, it's, it's really good to be in the public. Um, everyone's lovely and we're, you know, we.

• 15:13Speaker 02

  We're lucky.

• 15:13Speaker 03

  We have, we're blessed lives and it's amazing. But this, I mean, I, we were in there, I was in there most of the night and I only made a couple of calls to family and to Terry Venables, who was the Tottenham manager, because I was.

• 15:27Speaker 02

  You were playing for Tottenham then, weren't you?

• 15:28Speaker 03

  Tottenham.

• 15:28Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 15:29Speaker 03

  So I, Terry said, right, he's, I said, Michelle's gonna stay with him because there's just room for her. I'm gonna go home and then I'm gonna, he said, he said, I'm gonna pick you up in the morning, I'll take you to the hospital. Um, and I said, thank you, and Terry came around, I opened the curtains and there were hordes of paparazzi and tell it, and it's like, so I'm dealing with what I've, you know, this absolute terrifying news. Um, and, but we, he, he took me to the hospital and then for about three weeks, I s- I was there all day with Michelle and then I'd go home late at night, she'd stay.

• 16:10Speaker 03

  Um, there were ups and downs, um, they, they were incredibly honest doctors as they are, matter of fact, and they, the next morning when the test came through, said, right, we know it's acute myeloid leukemia, um, blah, blah, blah. And they said, under these circumstances, we'd, we'd give him a, between a 10 and 20% chance.

• 16:33Speaker 02

  A survival.

• 16:34Speaker 03

  Of making it, yeah. And that is like, it's hard to describe that emotion because most of it was just fear.

• 16:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:42Speaker 03

  Fear, you know, you just go, and I used to have these, I have recurring dreams of like carrying a white coffin, little tiny white coffins, blah, there was just, but even though we were told, we were told, we were told at least twice that he might not make it through the night. Um, but he did and he, he kind of, whatever was thrown at him, he got, he got through, but the other parents weren't as lucky as us next to us in the ward.

• 17:11Speaker 02

  I mean, when you experienced that as well, it's, when, when you left the hospital and you knew he was through the worst, how did that change? Because I think an experience like that of coming that close to losing someone you love or supporting someone, trying to help them through something, changes your whole life, right?

• 17:33Speaker 03

  It has to.

• 17:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:34Speaker 03

  It has to, it's obviously your imminent life, because thing, you have to work around things. And also, as, as, as we know, the, the most important thing with cancer is to get the patient into remission and they got George into remission quickly, that was important. Um, but then you have to have other courses of chemo and then it's a question of, once you've, the cancer's not there, it's whether it comes back.

• 17:58Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 17:58Speaker 03

  And, you know, we, even when you leave hospital, which we had seven months and we, in all clear, but at the same time, we do know there's a serious chance that it, it could come back.

• 18:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 18:10Speaker 03

  Um, so they say five years for cure, five years post treatment for, for, for cure, but, but, you know, we had four sons in the end and if any of the other three had a cold or anything like that, you wouldn't think anything of it. But when George, it was like, oh my, I always got a cold, is it, is it?

• 18:28Speaker 02

  Right.

• 18:29Speaker 03

  Is it, if it, like a spot on his face, like a little spot because of his head thing, you go, and you, you never really relax on it, but, um. But we were one of the lucky ones, a lot of the parents did, they didn't, and, and what, however early it was, he just clung on to a little bit of hope and that, I think, got us through it in, in, in different ways. I, I was always more comfortable and it helped me, I found to talk about it.

• 18:57Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 18:58Speaker 03

  Michelle couldn't talk about it. So, you know, we dealt with things in, in a different ways, albeit together.

• 19:05Speaker 02

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• 21:36Speaker 02

  Parenting you. I this little bit that I have met you and talked to you, we've talked about being parents. And I know what a great dad you are and how plugged in you are. But I I know that your parents were amazing. Can you just talk to me a bit about the influence that your parents had on you when you were a kid? Because you are a lot of your mum.

• 21:59Speaker 03

  Hmm, I am.

• 22:00Speaker 02

  But your dad's work ethic, you know, he was a grafter, but also he sacrificed a lot for you, right?

• 22:08Speaker 03

  Oh, very much so. Um, I'm definitely more my mum's personality because she's always quite calm.

• 22:16Speaker 03

  Whereas my dad's a bit more fiery. And he's a market trader and a card player and a drinker. And he was, he lived life to life to the max, but he worked, he worked his socks off. So, and they, you know, they used to go and watch me play all the time and my brother, Wayne.

• 22:33Speaker 02

  How old were you when you, when you started knowing that like you loved football?

• 22:38Speaker 03

  Well, it's a, it's a little bit different to now because you, you didn't really play any kind of competitive football until you were about under 11. So it would have been nine, 10, around that age that, um, by the time I was probably 12, 13, people were going, these, you know, I was scoring like ridiculous amounts of goals.

• 22:59Speaker 02

  But your dad saw it before then, didn't he?

• 23:02Speaker 03

  Well, he did, but because, I mean, we moved out of the city to a place called Kirby Muckslow, just outside the city centre. And I passed the 11 plus. And it meant that I would go to, I only had one choice of school because of where we were about where we'd just moved to.

• 23:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:23Speaker 03

  And that was a rugby playing school. And my dad said, I can't, you know, you know, no, he said, that happened to me. He said, that's not happening to you. So they just.

• 23:31Speaker 02

  So did you, did you, like kicked a ball about with your dad? Could he see that you had a thing?

• 23:36Speaker 03

  He must have done. I had a conversation, it was one of the last conversations we ever had. Um, he died about, um, about 10 years ago. And, and one of the last conversations we had was, you know, we were talking about my career and that's nice. And I went, you know, you did all these things because they moved house for me and I went to live with my grandparents for eight months, which was great because boy, could she make a cake. So anyway, so they moved and I lived with my grandparents just so I could go and play for a football in school. And I had this conversation with him on, almost on his deathbed. And I said, you know, to do that, you, you must have saw something. He went, I always knew.

• 24:19Speaker 03

  I went, I went, why didn't you ever tell me?

• 24:24Speaker 03

  He said, well, no, you've got to keep grounded and all this. But, I mean, I didn't know. I didn't know until I was well into my career that I, yeah. But he always, yeah. He was the only person on the planet that backed me to be the gold, the, win the golden boot in 1986. I think he got about 16 to one or something. So there you go.

• 24:46Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 24:46Speaker 03

  Dad knew.

• 24:47Speaker 02

  That's amazing. While we're on that, I just want to say you were the highest goal scorer until this World Cup.

• 24:56Speaker 03

  Oh, I know.

• 24:57Speaker 02

  What was, because, you know, Gary, that, that is, well, first off, well done.

• 25:04Speaker 03

  For lasting that long.

• 25:05Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 25:05Speaker 03

  It's a record had for a long time.

• 25:07Speaker 02

  It is incredible.

• 25:08Speaker 03

  Anyway, and well done, Harry Kane.

• 25:10Speaker 02

  But you were really lovely about him at that moment.

• 25:14Speaker 03

  Quite rightly so, because he's, he's, he's, he's not only a wonderful footballer and a brilliant, brilliant goal scorer and hugely talented, but, you know, he's sound, isn't he? He's just, he's a really good bloke.

• 25:27Speaker 02

  You can tell.

• 25:28Speaker 03

  You can tell. I mean, I've, do you know, I've never met him?

• 25:31Speaker 02

  No, seriously?

• 25:32Speaker 03

  No, I've never, of all the, I've met lots of.

• 25:33Speaker 02

  God, if we'd have known that, we'd have made that happen.

• 25:37Speaker 03

  And we've flown him, we've flown him a thousand miles from Munich to be here with you tonight.

• 25:42Speaker 02

  Let's make that show. I'd love to, this is your life. I love that bloody show. Let's do that again. Amen.

• 25:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 25:48Speaker 02

  Yeah. God, we're showing our age.

• 25:50Speaker 03

  I always thought of it because I, I never fancied that this is your life. So they don't tell you, but my agent was under strict instructions if they ever asked me.

• 25:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, never.

• 26:00Speaker 03

  Imagine someone turning up that you don't like.

• 26:02Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 26:04Speaker 02

  What are you doing here?

• 26:05Speaker 03

  Yeah, I know.

• 26:06Speaker 02

  That must have happened sometimes.

• 26:08Speaker 03

  Oh, it absolutely must have happened. Yeah. Because they obviously genuinely surprise you.

• 26:14Speaker 02

  God, there's so much heart. There's not enough time in my life to talk to you. But what I want to get under the skin of with you, Gary, is that all the emotions and the, you've had a lot of, um, loss in your life. You're gifted enormous things through your talent and your playing and your presenting and your business and everything. But you also leave big things and move on. So in terms of beginning again, these are the things, these are, these are the reasons why people stay stuck. Some where they don't like, some of them are not enjoying because they love the people, they love the office, they're going, you're just like, nope, leaving, gone, gone, next thing.

• 26:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:57Speaker 02

  And, um, it's, it's, I admire it.

• 27:00Speaker 03

  Well, you've got no choice with football, right? So because, I mean, you can stay in football, which I did in a different way, but you can't continue to be a footballer because, you know, you, you come to a certain age where you can't function as well.

• 27:14Speaker 02

  But what's that feel like?

• 27:16Speaker 03

  I think I was, I'm not going to say lucky because it was, I didn't enjoy it because I was injured for the, almost the last two years that I played, um, or didn't play. I was in Japan and, and I only played a handful of games there. And I spent pretty much the last year of football trying to get myself fit in rehab. And it was grueling and it was boring. And I was without the, the buzz of a game at the end of the week. And I was, just got me to the stage where I thought, I'm ready to do something else. And you know, you've got to, because there's a lot of life after football. You can't just quit. I mean, the players now earn significant amounts of money that they probably could.

• 27:58Speaker 03

  You couldn't have done, even though I was well paid relatively in my day, it doesn't compare with the modern day. So, you know, there's a lot of life. So I was already planning on going into the media side of things because I, I, I looked at things like tennis and golf and others, cricket. And the people that ran the shows were all former players, you know, David Gower in cricket, Sue Barker in tennis, pretty much all of them in golf were former players. So I thought if I could get into the media, but not only as a pundit, which was just starting to be a quite a big thing. I thought if I could possibly present as well, it might give me some form of longevity.

• 28:42Speaker 02

  And you had a chat with some of the presenters, didn't you, to kind of say what, you know, what's your special thing?

• 28:47Speaker 03

  I was keen to learn. And even when we're, even when I was a player, I used to sit with the camera crews or the radio people or some of the journalists, see how they did their columns and open themselves. I was quite curious. I was always curious. I think, yeah, I've definitely always been curious about all sorts of things. Sometimes not, not, sometimes not for the better.

• 29:09Speaker 02

  And so you end up, um, realising, well, okay, I can make this jump from football to not just being a pundit, but actually being a host on a, a, a sports programme. I, I quickly do just want to talk about what it's like. So you, you'd been in Japan, but when you left the UK, because there is something, I don't understand how much you would grieve leaving a group of people that you've been with through thick and thin, through all those letdowns and triumphs.

• 29:42Speaker 03

  Football is that that does change all the time.

• 29:45Speaker 02

  Right.

• 29:46Speaker 03

  Always, you know, you move clubs or some players, some players have one career, what, you know, long career at one club. Um, and I suppose that would apply more to them. But even then it's, you, you, you look at a squad now of a team, a big team now and compare it with six years' time. There won't be many left. There'll be, you know, there won't be, there'll be kind of probably a handful of players that are still there. So it's something you get used to. You get, you get suddenly, suddenly you find a new mate and then he's gone.

• 30:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 30:17Speaker 03

  And sometimes you stay in touch and with others, you, you, you just don't. So.

• 30:23Speaker 02

  Because in a funny kind of way, it's like prepping you for all the change that you have in your life anyway. It's like, oh, change, I've changed living where I live, I've changed where my family all live, we all move.

• 30:32Speaker 03

  Well, I played, you know, I played for a few different clubs in two different countries of, aside from here as well. So I think it probably, it's not, it wasn't part of the plan thinking, well, this will prepare me for life, obviously. But I think it does, I think it does a little bit. You know, you're suddenly in an environment, you're in a different country and you've, you've got to get on. You've got to learn the language, you've got, you know, um, live the culture, which was quite easy in Barcelona and Japan as well, I would say.

• 30:58Speaker 02

  Barcelona, I love Barcelona, what a city.

• 31:01Speaker 03

  I love Barcelona.

• 31:02Speaker 02

  Oh, my God, so brilliant.

• 31:04Speaker 03

  Second, Helen.

• 31:05Speaker 02

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• 31:41Speaker 02

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• 33:12Speaker 02

  How did you go from Japan to TV?

• 33:15Speaker 03

  Well, I'd already started planning to do things and, and I think it's, I get a lot of, I'm sure you do. A lot of people say, how do I get into the media world? How do I do it? How do you get into sports reporting? I said, well, you know, just watch as much as you can, write things, practise when you can, maybe try and get into some charity radio, hospital radio, local radio, school stuff, anything that you can do and maybe you'll get a chance. Or you can score 40 odd goals for England. So, which is my, no, but it's true. That was my way in.

• 33:54Speaker 03

  I was lucky because of that. So, you know, if I'd have just been, you know, a regular player, I'd been so successful. It's true.

• 34:03Speaker 02

  You weren't lucky.

• 34:04Speaker 03

  I was lucky to be born good at football. So, yeah. But I have been lucky. I've had an amazing life, amazing life.

• 34:12Speaker 02

  Worked hard.

• 34:13Speaker 03

  Yes, but lots of people work hard.

• 34:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's true.

• 34:16Speaker 03

  I was born with a gift. I was born with a gift to score goals and, and that gave me a massive, massive start in life.

• 34:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:23Speaker 03

  Big advantage.

• 34:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:25Speaker 03

  And I'm aware of how lucky I've been, I think.

• 34:27Speaker 02

  I think also you were lucky because, and now I'm telling you you're lucky, but you worked hard and you got to where you got to with your scoring goals. But also you are a good communicator.

• 34:38Speaker 03

  I wasn't when I was young though. I was so shy when I, yeah, I remember.

• 34:42Speaker 02

  Were you shy?

• 34:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, I was terribly shy in my, you know, late teens and early twenties. I'm a very late developer as well. So, um, yeah, I was always a bit, I overcame that. I'm definitely not too shy now. But, and, and people go, yeah, you're not that shy. But I was when I was, when I was young. But I think all the travelling and all the experience that I have helped that, yeah.

• 35:06Speaker 02

  So how did you get into kind of the BBC or did you, did you start at the bead?

• 35:11Speaker 03

  I did a couple of bits for various, I think I did a little bit for ITV, um, a couple of things. And then BBC wanted to, we had a conversation. Brian Bar was head of sport at that point. And, and Brian was, was keen to get me in. And it involved doing quite a bit of punditry for the start whilst I learnt the trade of presenting, which I did on, on radio. So Radio Five, um, and let's say I wasn't very good.

• 35:43Speaker 03

  I was a rabbit in the headlights, particularly when the TV started. But so, you know, it's the difficulty. I didn't learn like a lot of people do on some little show that no one ever watches. I was learning, I was learning on football, which is watched by a lot. I think when I started presenting, the second show I ever did was the highlights of England, Scotland in the Euros in 1996. And there were 11 million people watching it. That's the second show I'd ever done.

• 36:11Speaker 02

  God.

• 36:11Speaker 03

  I didn't know that at the time, but I assumed it'd be a biggie because England, Scotland, and it was such a huge game. It was, you know, the Gaza moment and the dentist chair and all that celebration. So it was, it was a baptism of fire. I wasn't brilliant by any stretch of the imagination, but I wasn't quite bad enough for them to give up on me. So they gave me time. Um, and, and, and there were so many times I, I started to present Football Focus, which was my first real, regular television slot. And I'd drive home sometimes at Saturday lunchtime after the show, thinking, I'm never going to be able to do this live thing, listening to people talking in my ear. You know exactly what it's like.

• 36:57Speaker 03

  But in the end, you get to enjoy it and it's part of the fun.

• 37:00Speaker 02

  I mean, I was gonna say.

• 37:00Speaker 03

  Hit an account and all this sort of, yeah.

• 37:03Speaker 02

  And now if I have to do something that's recorded.

• 37:06Speaker 03

  I know.

• 37:07Speaker 02

  I'm like, well, we've got to do it again.

• 37:09Speaker 03

  It's really boring.

• 37:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:13Speaker 03

  It's not, it's not, it's not. Well, I hope it's not. People will decide.

• 37:17Speaker 02

  But it is funny. I mean, at least this, it does feel, we're doing it as live.

• 37:22Speaker 03

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 37:23Speaker 02

  But when they go, actually, can we do another take of that? And you're like, oh God. It's not that I'm not grateful, but it's just when you're used to just doing, this is it, it's gone, ad break, gone, like.

• 37:34Speaker 03

  I, I, I much prefer the live, the live in, in that sense that for the buzz, it's, it's good, you know? But I've done a lot of pre-recorded and obviously the box that's about to come out was pre-recorded, but, but.

• 37:49Speaker 02

  But again, it's as live.

• 37:51Speaker 03

  It's as live because you can't repeat the stunts and the games and the exercises. So there's, it's even though there were lots of, you know, times you do the show and then you've got to wait while they set up the next challenge, et cetera.

• 38:03Speaker 02

  Right.

• 38:03Speaker 03

  Um, but, so they're long, they're long days, but then Match of the Day were long days as well. Very long days.

• 38:09Speaker 02

  You know what's quite funny is how many boxes you have in your life. Cause you've often talked about.

• 38:14Speaker 03

  Yeah. Cause I was, yeah, the old one, born to be in the box.

• 38:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:19Speaker 03

  Learned to be on the box, soon to be in a box. Anyway.

• 38:22Speaker 02

  Go in a box.

• 38:23Speaker 03

  Sonya Marathon. It's closer all the time. But yeah, and then to get a show called The Box.

• 38:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, to get the show called The Box.

• 38:30Speaker 03

  Yeah. I was a natural fit.

• 38:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, of course. Absolutely. Um, so then you, you become a pundit. And, um, you, how long were you with the BBC? Like 20 years?

• 38:41Speaker 03

  Overall, um, overall, almost 30. So, so I started in about 95 and finished in 25. So that's 30. Yeah. And it was, it was 25 years.

• 38:54Speaker 02

  95 was yesterday. That's what's so mad.

• 38:57Speaker 03

  I know. It's mad. How quickly it goes. But we're still here. Um, yeah, it was, cause it was 25 years of Match of the Day and I'd started that when Des left in 99.

• 39:07Speaker 02

  Des?

• 39:08Speaker 03

  Des, Des was, Des was, Des was the master. I learnt a lot from Des.

• 39:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 39:13Speaker 03

  Being alongside him, cause I did two years as punditry for Match of the Day and, and Des was in the chair and, you know, talk about calm, the calmness, yeah. And a humour that I think,

• 39:27Speaker 03

  you, you can't learn humour, but he, he taught me to be brave enough not to worry about trying to have a bit of fun. And he says, so many sports presenters, he said, they're good, he said, but they're safe and they're serious. And he said, it will give you an edge. And I, I, I went with that. And sometimes, you know, you try a silly pun at the end of the show. If it makes three people happy in the country, it's, it's, that's satisfactory. You know, it might make a lot of people go, oh, here he goes again, stupid pun. But that's fine.

• 39:59Speaker 02

  It's good.

• 39:59Speaker 03

  It's good, yeah.

• 40:00Speaker 02

  Do you think, um, that you've helped other presenters? Obviously, well, you know, we're getting to the stage now where we've got other people, like you said, always kind of saying to us like, how do you do it? How have you got on? Like, what can I learn from you? And that you've done the same as Des did for you, for other people. Like, can we talk about Micah?

• 40:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, of course.

• 40:21Speaker 02

  Please tell me he's as lovely as I think he is.

• 40:23Speaker 03

  He's, I'm, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but he's even more lovely than.

• 40:26Speaker 02

  Oh God. Gary, did you see my face fall for a moment?

• 40:31Speaker 03

  No, Micah's great. Um, I mean, hopefully he won't listen to this.

• 40:36Speaker 02

  He won't be able to get out of the door. It's gonna be so big. Is he hilarious? Cause his laugh, honestly, I think I would.

• 40:43Speaker 03

  No, he's, he's a lot of fun. He's a, he's, he's got an amazing presence and real energy. Um, and he's the reason why it took quite a long time to do a football pod. Cause I was, I wanted, I wanted to get Micah. I recognised it quite early when he's, I'd never met him before he started doing Match of the Day. He did a few shows and I, you know.

• 41:07Speaker 02

  Did you see it immediately?

• 41:08Speaker 03

  Fairly immediately. Yeah. The, this energy, and he's grown into it more and more. So he's, he's just one of those, he's got such a great enthusiasm and he can turn it on for the, when it, I mean, for example, during, during the summer, we did the show, we did for Netflix and it was amazing.

• 41:26Speaker 02

  It was really amazing. Congratulations.

• 41:28Speaker 03

  Thank you. It was, it couldn't have gone better. So, but Micah was obviously a key part of that. But he was also at home because he was doing the, they were doing it from, BBC were doing it from Salford. So in, in the green box and the time changes meant that a lot of the nights that he would then come and do our show from his, when he got home from his garage where we set up this beautiful shop. But sometimes it'd be three or four in the morning, you think, God, and he's got, he comes in his way. And then boom, and it's like this energy. Um, so he was one of the reasons that it took a long while to do our podcast because I was waiting for him.

• 42:05Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 42:06Speaker 03

  And eventually we got to. Oh God, he knows that. And obviously Alan as well, I've worked with forever. Alan Shearer is Alan Shearer. Alan's solid.

• 42:15Speaker 02

  I don't know. I feel like I know Alan. You know what I mean?

• 42:19Speaker 03

  He's exactly as you imagine. So, yeah. And so to get those two together, it took, took a long time, but it worked.

• 42:27Speaker 02

  This thing of going from the BBC to Netflix, um, I know that the BBC is a place where you are quite kind of, um, well, it's the BBC and they have people to answer to and they have the public to answer to. We all pay the licence fee, blah, blah, blah. But suddenly you're on Netflix. Were you like, knees up, mother brown. Okay, let's go.

• 42:47Speaker 03

  You could say that. I mean, I will say that I, I, I love the BBC for all its, for all its faults.

• 42:52Speaker 02

  Oh, I mean.

• 42:53Speaker 03

  And it has a few, obviously.

• 42:54Speaker 02

  But it's an amazing institution.

• 42:56Speaker 03

  It is. And it's still hugely respected around the world and we should be proud of it. Um, and it was, you know, I've been married twice and, you know, eventually you kind of go your different ways. And it was a bit like that with the BBC. So, um, and but yet I must say though, living life outside of the BBC without having that thing on the show, it's, it, it's nice not treading on eggshells all the time.

• 43:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:21Speaker 03

  And, um, and, you know, lots of things have happened subsequently.

• 43:25Speaker 02

  So now, um, that the World Cup's over, like, where's that going?

• 43:29Speaker 03

  Well, it turns back into the, the podcast that we, we've already done, which the show was based on. Um, Netflix are, are taking a

• 43:36Speaker 02

  But you're gonna do more.

• 43:37Speaker 03

  Monthly episode.

• 43:38Speaker 02

  Right, right.

• 43:39Speaker 03

  And obviously we're, we're up specing the cameras in our various homes. So, um, they've wanted to continue, which, which was great. You know, I know what it's like in a World Cup and I was, I was convinced it would be the same. That once it starts taking shape and England start doing okay, then the country goes mad. And they can't get enough of football. Everyone wants a bit of stress a bit. So from my experience of many, many, many, many World Cups, um, I, I knew that would happen, um, as long as England progressed because it was a Netflix show, but it's based at UK audience, even though we did get an audience from all parts of the world as well. So it was fun because

• 44:19Speaker 03

  also I was slightly nervous about doing this show because they don't tend to work these kind of shows. We, but normally they're comedically led. So you've seen a lot of these post England game shows or post-World Cups and where, and they've always, they've really flopped mostly.

• 44:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 44:36Speaker 03

  So I was a little bit worried, but I think because we went at it with actually a serious football head on.

• 44:41Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 44:41Speaker 03

  But also have some fun as well. To get it that way round, I think it, it, it made it work. It did.

• 44:48Speaker 02

  I mean, I don't really know much about football.

• 44:51Speaker 03

  That's all right.

• 44:52Speaker 02

  When it's a big campaign.

• 44:53Speaker 03

  But I've lagged it for years.

• 44:55Speaker 02

  When, when, when it's a big campaign, I'm excited. I'm also a gooner, I'm sorry.

• 45:01Speaker 03

  Right, you're a gooner. Well, you, happy days.

• 45:04Speaker 02

  My dad, my dad, yeah, happy days.

• 45:07Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 45:07Speaker 02

  My dad used to take me when I was a little girl and then I took my son. And now it's like, it's the best thing ever. Anyway, but I, I, I go and he has to explain everything to me, but I love it. But this year, and I know nothing, and I don't know if you felt the same, I really thought it was coming home.

• 45:27Speaker 03

  We need to get rid of that phrase, cause it's a jinx. It's such a jinx.

• 45:31Speaker 02

  Do you have a jinx to it again?

• 45:32Speaker 03

  Well, no, because we're already home.

• 45:33Speaker 02

  Okay, okay.

• 45:34Speaker 03

  But we've come, we're home, but it is not.

• 45:39Speaker 02

  Was it my fault?

• 45:40Speaker 03

  It is in Spain.

• 45:43Speaker 03

  So don't blame yourself, don't blame yourself. I know.

• 45:46Speaker 02

  It was, it was seriously gonna happen. I had a real vibe.

• 45:50Speaker 03

  I didn't.

• 45:50Speaker 02

  You didn't?

• 45:51Speaker 03

  No, not this, I, no, I didn't quite, I, I thought we got to about where we are. I think we got in a position where we should have made it fine. I think we'd have really still.

• 46:02Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 46:02Speaker 03

  The best team won. The best team won the World Cup. There's no question about that. They were so dominant, so good. They only conceded one goal. They, they played really good possession football. Um, I thought England did, did okay. I think they'll really regret the last half an hour against Argentina because

• 46:22Speaker 02

  Oh my god.

• 46:23Speaker 03

  They, it, I, you know, I've played in games and subconsciously sometimes you just try and hold on to what you've got. And I think Thomas Tuchel, if he reflects, and I'm sure he has, will go, I think I exacerbated that by bringing on defenders and making it more. Um, and, you know, you can look at things tactically, like if you've got that many defenders on the pitch, how can you give Messi that much space to, to kill you? Um, so there were lots of things, but prior to that, you know, we, a wonderful performance against Mexico in altitude, with real gutsy and got through it.

• 46:57Speaker 02

  It was so good.

• 46:59Speaker 03

  Although I think maybe that victory in hanging on like they did there, but that was with ten men. Might have influenced his thinking in the Argentina game.

• 47:07Speaker 02

  Right, right.

• 47:08Speaker 03

  But, but I think we did, we did pretty well. We had some really good perform, you know, Harry Kane got his goals. Jude Belling was fabulous, absolutely brilliant.

• 47:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, that was.

• 47:17Speaker 03

  Some good, really good performances, but once again, not quite enough.

• 47:22Speaker 02

  Can I just say something?

• 47:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 47:24Speaker 02

  Everything that you've just said there, I'm gonna use another day to make myself.

• 47:29Speaker 03

  Next time you're at dinner with someone.

• 47:30Speaker 02

  Really good.

• 47:31Speaker 03

  And they'll go, you don't know what the fuck you're talking about.

• 47:34Speaker 02

  I'll go, actually I do, because Gary told me. Um, you know, you've, you've left the BBC, but you've done this great thing. I'd like to talk about this petition that you guys have signed and what that's about and what you are trying to suggest to the Prime Minister.

• 47:49Speaker 03

  Oh, the billionaires pay tax. Well, I think if, you know, there comes a point in your life where you, you, you have a wealth and, um, I think you can perhaps contribute to society. Now, I know you can just do that anyway if you want to, if you wanna. I think there's a way of just paying the, and, you know, we, we, we all do stuff with charities and things like that. But I think it misses the point when they argue about the fact, well, just do it anyway. But I think if you can get it as a, as a kind of law, that super wealthy contribute more to society.

• 48:20Speaker 02

  It would make sense.

• 48:21Speaker 03

  Well, it's, it's, and it wouldn't really make any difference to them. How much do you actually need?

• 48:26Speaker 02

  I was just gonna say that.

• 48:26Speaker 03

  Especially when you're talking about obviously super wealthy, um, like the billionaires and you think, well, and they said, well, they'll just leave the country. Will they really over like naught point two percent of their wealth? I mean, would they? Why? And you, and you just think, well, would you want those kind of people in the country then?

• 48:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:42Speaker 03

  I think, you know, as, as someone that's pretty wealthy, I, you know, I've always been, you know, contributed for tax. I've always paid top, top level tax and for a long, long, long, long time. Um, and happy to do so. And then, and if, you know, if they want us to dip in, I think, I think most of us would like to help in a way. So, um, we'll see if the government does that. There'd be a lot of lobbying against it, of course, from the super rich.

• 49:07Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 49:08Speaker 03

  Cause for some reason it's, I don't know, it's like a, it's like a, my dick's bigger than your dick kind of game for them, a lot of them. I've got a bigger boat than you and I've got this and the other. I, I don't quite get it, so.

• 49:19Speaker 02

  But I think it's helpful.

• 49:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 49:21Speaker 02

  That you get it out there and you speak about it because I think it might inspire other people.

• 49:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, I hope so.

• 49:28Speaker 02

  To do something similar and it could make a really big difference. So well done, Gary.

• 49:33Speaker 03

  Well, it's, it's not, it's not moved, it's not, it's not moved the government yet, but if it does, then we can say, well done.

• 49:40Speaker 02

  So Gary, you mentioned earlier about, you know, you've been married twice and obviously you and Michelle, um, I, I, I know because I've done it. Um, splitting up with somebody in the public eye is a fucking nightmare.

• 49:54Speaker 03

  It's horrible, yeah.

• 49:55Speaker 02

  Oh my god, because, and, and you were, you were kind of on good terms with both your exes when you split up. Can you tell me what that's like going through that? Because.

• 50:05Speaker 03

  It's so, it's so difficult to do it because it becomes a public. Um, and I don't understand, you know, people say, well, it's part and parcel of being a, a famous or a celebrity or whichever way you want to describe it. But, but, you know, personal lives and with your, you know, things.

• 50:25Speaker 02

  And basically you've got kids as well.

• 50:26Speaker 03

  I, I look back and I look back and we had this thing particularly back then where that is really, that's a sight on your, you know, that you get divorced, that's, that's a failure. You, you're to, someone has to, they used to have this thing that someone has to take the blame.

• 50:43Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 50:43Speaker 03

  Which was ridiculous.

• 50:45Speaker 02

  So funny. Someone's got to be at fault to get a divorce.

• 50:48Speaker 03

  Exactly. Thankfully that law has now changed because it was ridiculous. One of you had to admit, and you not only had to say, you had, we had to invent something. We had to invent something for it. It was ridiculous. I mean, I was gonna, I took the blame for both marriages, but it, we had to make up the thing because actually it was just an amicable arrangement because, you know, we've been, I look at it as I had two. People say they're failures. No, I had two really successful marriages.

• 51:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, you did.

• 51:13Speaker 03

  Really good. Twenty years together, four children, Michelle, Danielle, we had a few years, we, we split in the end because of children. And, and we're best mates, absolutely best mates now. We see each other regularly. Um, so, and it's, and it works. And, you know, I'm not sure we're meant to be the same people forever. Some people are, which is great, and other people are not. But, you know, going through it in the media and it's front page news and it's like, you, you know, when you've got kids as well, it's, it makes it really, really hard to, to deal with. But, um, it is part and parcel of, of, of being in the public eye. But I don't think, I don't think it should be, and it's fair.

• 51:52Speaker 02

  I mean, I.

• 51:53Speaker 03

  You sell your whole life.

• 51:54Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 51:55Speaker 03

  As long as you go.

• 51:56Speaker 02

  Yes, if, if you're a reality TV star.

• 51:58Speaker 03

  You can sort of say, well, under those circumstances, it's fair, maybe it's fair game. But I spoke to some of the, you know, main editors of the newspapers in those days. And I think it was like a game for them to just try and mess up your life a little bit.

• 52:12Speaker 02

  I, I had somebody, um, I did a, I did a chat show and it wasn't my finest hour, but I literally got ripped to shreds. And the guy that started it was like, yeah, we knew you'd be all right though.

• 52:27Speaker 03

  But I don't, but they don't know you'll be all right, yeah.

• 52:29Speaker 02

  Well, they, and I think they thought that I would be. And I think that he genuinely was like, I knew we could take you down and you'd be all right.

• 52:36Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 52:36Speaker 02

  But I, I, I was sitting in my car going into Sainsbury's. Um, this, they don't sponsor the show, but if they'd like to, give us a call. Um, but with my head on the steering wheel.

• 52:48Speaker 03

  Other supermarkets are available.

• 52:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, are available. Um, with my head on the steering wheel thinking, I can't go in again because.

• 52:57Speaker 02

  I was getting rubbed on the back with sympathy. It was that savage. Like, people were just looking at me across the aisle going, "Oh bless you." And you think-

• 53:05Speaker 03

  Well, there's a perception that you don't have feelings when you... And it's also, it's quite difficult. You don't want to whine too much because we do have incredibly great lives.

• 53:14Speaker 02

  But also, we need the press.

• 53:16Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 53:16Speaker 02

  Like, we need to advertise your podcast and my podcast. But it's got better.

• 53:24Speaker 03

  I think it's got better. I was gonna say that it's changed a bit. It's not got that gotcha, that gotcha nature that it had for years and years and years and obviously through the phone hacking and all those terrible things that they do.

• 53:35Speaker 02

  Did your phone get hacked?

• 53:36Speaker 03

  Uh, yes. Yeah. Yeah. I think everyone's did.

• 53:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:39Speaker 03

  I'm sure yours did as well, yeah. I think pretty much everyone was getting hacked in those days. But, um, but I think, I feel like it's got better in terms of, yeah, trying to, basically trying to ruin people's lives, which was, seems a weird thing to want to do. But that's, I think for them, it was a bit of a game.

• 53:58Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 53:59Speaker 03

  Um, but again, there are a lot of good aspects to the media and the newspapers, but...

• 54:04Speaker 02

  I was just thinking in terms of, like, everything you went through then. And, um, are you with anybody now?

• 54:11Speaker 03

  No, I'm single.

• 54:13Speaker 02

  But how long have you been single for, Gary?

• 54:14Speaker 03

  Um, I've had, um, quite a few years now. That would be-

• 54:19Speaker 02

  Gary.

• 54:20Speaker 03

  I dated for a while about four, three, four years ago. Not since.

• 54:27Speaker 02

  Right. I need to sort this out.

• 54:29Speaker 03

  All right. You're asking me out?

• 54:31Speaker 02

  I got married. I'm sorry about that. But, um, I, I can't believe that. Because you are such a lovely-

• 54:40Speaker 03

  No, I, do you know what I have? I have a lot of female company and companions and friends.

• 54:45Speaker 02

  Are you talking about friends with bends?

• 54:47Speaker 03

  No, no friends with bends, no bends, unfortunately, no bends. I'm not up to much bends. I don't want to talk about my bends nowadays. But generally, I have a lot of female friends for company. I love female company, so.

• 54:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:59Speaker 03

  Um-

• 55:00Speaker 02

  You, you have got, like, a feminine energy. I think Michael, my husband's, got that.

• 55:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 55:05Speaker 02

  Like, um, you, you could be one of the girls. Like, we could all sit down and have a good old chat. Do you know what I mean?

• 55:11Speaker 03

  One of the girls, yeah.

• 55:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 55:12Speaker 03

  So I, I really do have a lot of really close friends, um, that I, I see fairly frequently. So it gives, it gives me that female- A lot of them are exes.

• 55:23Speaker 02

  Are they?

• 55:23Speaker 03

  A couple.

• 55:24Speaker 02

  I can imagine that.

• 55:25Speaker 03

  A couple. Yeah. But not, not a lot of them. But, um, but yeah, so I'd kind of, um, I don't-

• 55:32Speaker 02

  Gary, are they all in love with you, really, though?

• 55:34Speaker 03

  No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I think they, I think they suffer me. They put up with me.

• 55:40Speaker 02

  Gary, they're all, like, probably just going, waiting for you to see them, like-

• 55:44Speaker 03

  I definitely, no, definitely not.

• 55:46Speaker 02

  I think what's interesting is that, um, you know, I think that the danger is, as we get older, is that we feel like there's not enough room in our life in the end to put someone in it. Because we get so happy in our own company.

• 55:58Speaker 03

  Well, I'm-

• 55:59Speaker 02

  That's the danger, right?

• 56:00Speaker 03

  I'm okay in my own company. Um, but I, but what I am is, I just got so comfortable being on my own, in the, in the sense of, I'm not sure I can imagine, you know, regularly sleeping with someone again, or-

• 56:17Speaker 02

  Sharing a bed.

• 56:18Speaker 03

  Not that you have to, sharing a bed, or, you know, as you get older as well, you tend to make a few more bathroom trips in the night and stuff like that.

• 56:25Speaker 02

  But we all do that, men and women.

• 56:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, I know, but, you know, up and down, I'd say, anyway. But I'm, I'm not, I'm not ruling anything out. I'm just, who knows what might happen?

• 56:35Speaker 02

  I think it's an interesting thing of, like, the idea of, of being with somebody, going to bed with them, and then, and then going, "Okay, um, you go home and I'll see." It's, it means if you don't want to do that, it's quite difficult then. You'd end up having to leave someone's house to go, and then it's all like, "How am I gonna do that?" They'll feel a bit rejected.

• 56:55Speaker 03

  And the other things, you go on, the occasional date or something, something might happen. And then, you know, if you don't quite feel it, then you've got to try and say it and all that. And I'm not married.

• 57:06Speaker 02

  You don't want to hurt someone's feelings.

• 57:07Speaker 03

  I don't, I don't.

• 57:08Speaker 02

  I get that. I mean, I think what it is, is it's, it's almost, um, like, you need to reconnect with an old friend that you know really well. You don't have any of that awkwardness around. Like, that would be perfect.

• 57:21Speaker 03

  Maybe.

• 57:22Speaker 02

  Um, so go back to your Facebook, Gary.

• 57:25Speaker 03

  I never had Facebook, you know? Never.

• 57:28Speaker 02

  What?

• 57:28Speaker 03

  I had Twitter and then I had Instagram.

• 57:30Speaker 02

  You've got a massive following on Twitter, on X.

• 57:33Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah, I don't use it. I've not used it for years.

• 57:35Speaker 02

  I haven't either.

• 57:36Speaker 03

  It's horrible now, isn't it?

• 57:37Speaker 02

  It's gone dark.

• 57:38Speaker 03

  It's turned into a really dark, nasty place.

• 57:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, I like Insta.

• 57:41Speaker 03

  I don't bother.

• 57:42Speaker 02

  Do you do TikTok?

• 57:43Speaker 03

  No, I've never done TikTok.

• 57:44Speaker 02

  I don't know how to do it.

• 57:45Speaker 03

  No, I don't, I don't, even know when you get it.

• 57:46Speaker 02

  My daughter's trying to, like-

• 57:47Speaker 03

  Is it in the App Store?

• 57:48Speaker 02

  It's really, it's in the App Store, Gary. My God, you and me. Cut all of this bit out, we look terrible.

• 57:54Speaker 03

  It's all right, that's fine. I can, but I don't have to be on TikTok.

• 57:57Speaker 02

  TikToks.

• 57:58Speaker 03

  Yeah. Um, no dating apps either. Do you know any dating apps?

• 58:02Speaker 02

  I've never, I've never had to do that because I was with-

• 58:04Speaker 03

  I know.

• 58:04Speaker 02

  I was with Matty for twenty, twenty years. And then-

• 58:07Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 58:08Speaker 02

  Um, we would, we'd been friends for twenty years. So like, I've never, but that's hard, being, being well-known.

• 58:14Speaker 03

  Couldn't imagine going on a dating app.

• 58:16Speaker 02

  And meeting someone you don't know. Like, what? It's impossible. But you've gone into, um, my Begin Again, um, dating computer.

• 58:26Speaker 03

  Oh, okay.

• 58:27Speaker 02

  I have been, in the past, I don't want to show off or anything, but quite successful-

• 58:32Speaker 03

  I'll bet, yeah.

• 58:33Speaker 02

  -in matchmaking, um-

• 58:35Speaker 03

  I'll have you.

• 58:36Speaker 02

  -people.

• 58:36Speaker 03

  All right.

• 58:37Speaker 02

  Um, so I will, uh, look out for you. And I will be in touch when I find someone good enough.

• 58:45Speaker 03

  I think it's been-

• 58:46Speaker 02

  Sounds good?

• 58:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, it sounds great.

• 58:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, great.

• 58:48Speaker 03

  Sounds great, yeah. As long as they're good enough.

• 58:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Gotta be good enough.

• 58:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, go, be good enough.

• 58:52Speaker 02

  Um, and, um, what I also think is nice is that, uh, the right person brings out the best in you.

• 58:59Speaker 03

  Hmm. I think that's true.

• 59:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 59:01Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 59:02Speaker 02

  So I just want to say thank you for coming on.

• 59:06Speaker 03

  Oh, it's been, it's always a delight to see you.

• 59:08Speaker 02

  Honestly.

• 59:08Speaker 03

  It was the first time we've probably spoken properly.

• 59:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, ever.

• 59:11Speaker 03

  Because you've worked with each other ten times. We did, um-

• 59:14Speaker 02

  Sport relief.

• 59:15Speaker 03

  Sport relief a few times and stuff. And obviously met over the years, but never really had a conversation.

• 59:20Speaker 02

  Yeah. So it's really been lovely.

• 59:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, now you're gonna sort my love life out.

• 59:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, I am. Um, I'm actually quite good. I've got, uh, people that have started living together. They've now been together for five or six years. So thank you very much.

• 59:32Speaker 03

  That's worrying.

• 59:33Speaker 02

  So brace yourself.

• 59:33Speaker 03

  That's worrying.

• 59:34Speaker 02

  Yeah. But I understand, it is quite hard when you become independent. Um, and you are happy in your own company to, uh, let people in. But I think the right person would, you'd give space to.

• 59:47Speaker 03

  There you go.

• 59:48Speaker 02

  So, good luck.

• 59:49Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 59:49Speaker 02

  And I'm sorting it out. Um, and I just want to say thank you for being such a brilliant part of our lives for so long, for everything you've contributed to society and all the great entertainment you've given us and everything you've taught us-

• 1:00:04Speaker 03

  Don't make me cry.

• 1:00:05Speaker 02

  -with Goalhanger, and all the lessons we've learnt, and for being a great dad and a great role model. Um, so thank you very much, Gary.

• 1:00:13Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 1:00:14Speaker 02

  Big round of applause for Gary. Stay there, I'm coming over for an uncomfortably long hug. Brace yourself.

• 1:00:22Speaker 03

  That was great, thank you.

• 1:00:24Speaker 02

  So just in case you missed this episode here, um, if you loved this episode, I know you're gonna love that.

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