When Des Lynam hung up his moustache and walked away from the Match of the Day presenting gig in 1999, BBC bosses were faced with a conundrum. Lynam was popular with viewers and a sporting polymath but had jumped ship for ITV after they doubled his pay. Who could fill his boots on such a shoestring budget?
The answer was Gary Lineker. Described by the BBC, at the time, as having a “relaxed style”, Lineker was already familiar to viewers thanks not only to a stellar on-pitch career, but various presenting jobs across the corporation. He had appeared on Radio 5 Live and Grandstand, as well as a stint as a captain on They Think It’s All Over, a comedy panel show. And as the lights came up on the 1999/2000 Premier League season, he found himself in one of the biggest jobs in football media, presiding over the flagship highlights package of a season that featured 23 goals from his future sofa-mate, Alan Shearer. It was the start of a glittering 25-year tenure in the role – which the BBC has confirmed will conclude next May – that would turn him from a predatory striker to one of the nation’s top broadcasters, and then into a powerful, and often controversial, media mogul.
Lineker was born in 1960 in Leicester – a city famous in the Sixties for the creatives, like Joe Orton and Graham Chapman, who had run away from it – and there was little in his childhood to point to future footballing stardom. As a teenager he captained the Leicestershire Schools cricket team – yes, cricket – for five years, believing he’d have “more chance afterwards in cricket than football”.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة November 13, 2024 من The Independent.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
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هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة November 13, 2024 من The Independent.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
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