May 13, 2024 • 33 mins
My brother, Michael Elias, a writer and director tells me when visitors come to the set of a film, nothing stops. The only exception is if they are athletes.
Maybe it’s because everyone thinks, if pressed, they could act, sing or dance, but never run a race, ski downhill or score a goal. When Gary Lineker, one of the great footballers of our time, walks into The River Cafe everything stops.
He is one of the very few footballers never to have received a red or yellow card — consistent with who he is: principled, respectful and fair — values we share.
We’re also both in the world of podcasts - his company Goal Hanger has 18 million listeners a month.
Gary and I also share the world of food.
Look at his Instagram account and you will see as many photographs of what he is cooking as the games he is analysing on Match of the Day.
Today, Gary is in The River Cafe kitchen with Joseph Trivelli making Potato Gnocchi with tomato sauce.
When he comes back I will definitely stop what I’m doing to talk to him about food, football, family and principles.
It’s a goal.
Ruthie's Table 4 is made in partnership with Moncler.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You are listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
My brother Michael Elias, is a writer and director of movies,
tells me that when even a world famous actor comes
onto a set, no one on the crew bats an eye.
The only exception as if the visitor is an athlete.
Maybe it's because everyone thinks, if pressed, they could act,
or sing or dance, but never run a race, ski
(00:27):
down hill or kick a ball into a net.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
When Gary Lineker, one of.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
The great footballers of our time, walks into the River Cafe,
everyone stops what they're doing, and some months ago I
stopped what I was doing after reading his brave defense
of refugees landing in Britain and his pleas for empathy
compassion for people in peril. Gary is never silenced on
issues he feels strongly about.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
This sense of justice runs deep.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
He's one of the very few footballers never to have
received a red or yellow cat, consistent with who he is, principled,
respectful and fair. We're also both in the world of podcasts,
although there is no comparison when his company, Goldhanger, has
eighteen million Gary and I also share the world of
(01:16):
food and This is not the first time a footballer
has stepped on my turf. There's nothing Beckham loves more
than cooking. Ian Wright has his own food brand. Look
at Gary's Instagram and you'll see as many photographs of
what he's cooking as the goals he's analyzing. On Match
of the Day, Gary has been in the kitchen with
(01:37):
Joseph Travelli making potato yaki with tomato sauce.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
So the nyaki, what do you love about it?
Speaker 4 (01:43):
I love yoki. I think it's quite versatile as well.
You can kind of make it crispy and bake it
and stuff as well. But it just works with tomatoes,
thank you, doesn't it. I think I always always go
to tomatoes with yaki.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
It just was perfect because I was in actually last
week and I was taken to this quite fancy restaurant
and I never do this.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
I never changed something. But they had potato and yaki.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
With asparagus and for shoot, punchetta, and it was quite
quite complicated, and I just said, do you mind if
I have it with tomato, and it was so much better.
I saw the other ones and there was something we
do it, but we do it with other we.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Do it with you can do, but it's never as
good as it.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
I mean, there's something about yeah, Italian tomatoes as well.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
Yeah, do you cook a lot of Italian? Do you
go for Italian food?
Speaker 1 (02:33):
I cook a yeah, I do a lot of Italian food.
Speaker 4 (02:35):
Everyone just done there. I suppose it's it's kind of
one of the great cuisines. But I love cooking Indian
as well, and as well as kind of British basics
and stuff. So yeah, a variety of different things, but
I would say to cook probably Italian and Indiana my
favorite too.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
Have you been to India?
Speaker 1 (02:55):
No, It's on my bucket list actually.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
And so let's go back to growing up, because you
were born and I was.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Born in Lesti, and what was the food culture like there.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
Well, my dad was a market trader and he's a fruitter,
so he'd sell fruit. So he worked hard, get a
you know, three four in the morning, go to the
wholesale market by the fruit.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Sell it all day.
Speaker 4 (03:16):
But what you sell it was an outdoor market, the
biggest outdoor market in Europe at the time, and in Europe.
Yeah it's really well really yeah, well exactly. There were
also fish traders. There was a fish, you know, a
fish mumbry kind of thing, and there was there was
a meat place. So at the end of the week
he'd always kind of give them a big basket fruit
and then they give him like a nice piece of
(03:38):
meat or a haliburt. Used to he loved halibur and
so we'd get like that kind of thing and eat
on a on a Friday and a Saturday, would eat
kind of really amazing stuff because they used to do
these swamp things. So yeah, so I kind of grew
up with food in that sense. Didn't go out very
often but occasionally.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
It wasn't a wholesale market was it didn't get distributed
to the rest of Brittain.
Speaker 4 (04:00):
You're talking about this bester market. Leicester's now famous for
its football team, having won the Premier League. Obviously, in fact,
people suddenly started saying Leicester.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Properly, how do you say it properly? Well, Leicester?
Speaker 4 (04:15):
It was all Leicester, particularly in America and stuff. It
was always and suddenly people saying the name because you always.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Now because Leicester won the league.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
With the biggest sporting miracle ever, everyone knows how.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
To say it.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
Does your family still live there?
Speaker 4 (04:31):
The only distant family now my my mom and dad
passed away eight seven, eight years ago now, so so
I don't go back there as much, apart from the
occasional time to watch watch Leicester play if I'm.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Not working, which so have you had the ingredients of
fruit and vegetables and fish meat, but I didn't cook.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
A good cook.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
Tell me about her. What was her background? Where did
she come from?
Speaker 4 (04:57):
She actually born in a place called Sherringham which is
in Norfolk on the coaster, and moved to Leicester when
she was I think it was about ten ten or eleven,
and she was a hairdresser.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Be comes mom was a hairdresser.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Really, Yeah, there you go, she must be a football
thing maybe before.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
That's a lot of data.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Yeah, you can then come to a conclusion that two
footballers had bombs were hairdressing.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yeah. But she was a good cook, love cooking.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, so she work all day and then as.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Well when I was young, and then she kind of
stopped hairdressing.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
And my dad used to have a card school.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
The card school a girl called Kaluki playing cards as
he was a gambler, and they used to have like
five or six guys in that used to come to
our house, either on a Sunday, sometimes on a Monday,
but they'd start at like six o'clock in the evening,
and my mom would cook for everyone every night, and
she could get a little pound and out of the
pot every time they had a it was a kids
(06:03):
he going on all night. But I'd go to bed,
you know, because I'd have school on Monday morning, and
then i'd wake up in the morning get ready for school.
They're still playing, like yeah, eight, nine, ten o'clock in
the morning. Sometimes they'd go unbroken for thirty six hours. Yeah, honestly,
and my mom would constantly be supplying food all through
the night, and yeah, amazing.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
You know my dad.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
I grew up in upstate New York in a small town,
and my father played poker.
Speaker 3 (06:29):
Every Thursday night.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
They played poker as well sometimes.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And every Friday morning I'd come to go before I
went to school, there would be a note saying, dear Ruthie,
I won last night. Here's five dollars, Ruthie, I won
last night. He went every week and they'd always be
like five dollars or ten dollars, and then it was
his funeral. I went to his you know, when he
died I went to his funeral and it was like
a kind of quaker'sh funeral. Everybody spoke and this man
(06:53):
got up and he said, you know, fred Elias was
one of the greatest guys they ever knew.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
But he never won a game of poker. That was
really sweet.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
He did that every Friday.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
That's not my dad, but every day.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
So what would she cook? What did your mom cook
for you? What were her dishes like? Do you remember?
Speaker 4 (07:15):
Like most mothers, she'd cook a good spaghetti, bilonnaise, really
good with fish because we get a lot of fish
from the from the market.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
She'd do a really good roast as well.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
My kind either all of them, you know, douse your
father ever cook?
Speaker 1 (07:33):
I can't remember him cooking.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
And did you ever go in the kitchen? Did you
ever know?
Speaker 4 (07:37):
I wish I had. And I think that's the one
thing we fail our kids on. I think that should
be an absolute must learn at school. I mean they
used to offer it all the time that you still
can do a bit of cooking at school. But it's
a it's a life scale, it's a life you can
be really passionate about it, you know, rather than making
(07:58):
kids that are not very good at maths. Yes, you've
got to get your basic numbers and stuff, and reading
is really important, I think.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
But the next thing after those two for me has
to be like cooking.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
You know.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
That's what's one thing we all do forever is eat.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
The River Cafe is excited and June eighth we're opening
the River Cafe Cafe. Come for a morning Briochian cappuccino,
a plate of seasonal antipasity on the terrace, or an
ice cream or a peratubo in the sun. We can't
wait to open and we cannot wait to welcome you.
(08:46):
You came from this home in Leicester with your mother cooking,
your father playing cards, your badly dinners. Tell us about
the football when you when sport came into your life.
Speaker 4 (08:55):
Well, I came into my life way before I can
remember from you know, from pretty much that's where I wore.
It wasn't a specific days. Doesn't work like that football, now,
you know.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
I grew up playing in the garden my brother.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
We just kicked up all around all the time, obviously
reasonably good at even at nine ten eleven I was
playing and scoring like loads of goals.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
So I just went from there and I was spotted
by Leicester when I was about twelve. It's funny.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
My dad's market store was a family of generational business,
so the.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Big grandfather grandfather and his father before that. So yeah,
my granddad.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
Used to come and watchers play football everywhere. We were
quite a well known family in Leicester because of the
market store. And my granddad was watching me play one
Sunday morning and the guy called racial was there was
Leicester City's chief scout and he my grandad knew everyone,
(09:49):
knew everyone. He said, oh who you watching? He said,
I'm watching a little center forward up there. I was
tiny in those days, and he went, oh, that's my grandson.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
And they took me on.
Speaker 4 (09:58):
I trained two three nights a week at Leicester and
then saturdays as well for four or five years, and
then I got taken on.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
When did you leave the comfort of home?
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Not until I was twenty four. It was funny.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
When I first joined Leicester, I joined as an apprentice
and I was paid sixteen pounds a week, but they
bought an extra five in an envelope for my mom
because because loads of the kids there that came were
in digs, so the food was provided for them. So
they said, well, because you know, you don't get the
(10:31):
luxury of getting free food or slipping a fiver for
your mom. So I'd always give it to my mum,
but she'd never take it a bit like you.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
You sh'd always give it me back. She's I don't
want you, I don't want your money. So I was on.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Twenty one quid a week, not sixteen quid a week,
which is a bonus.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
So you were at home, so you had protection around
you in terms of your comfort of home. But what
about protection for being suddenly when you found fame. I'll
just say that I once this is I think I
might have told this before, but one of my programs
I always remember was Michael Parkinson interviewing David Beckham and
George Best, and George Best was you know. They were
(11:10):
on the sofa together and when he asked Beckham a question,
Beckham said, you know, I'm in the presence of one
of the great heroes of my life. I think, really
I don't want to talk. You should just talk to him,
you know. And what they did discuss was the you know,
the difference between now and then.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
You know.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
The Best said, he just came from a simple life
in the home and suddenly he was thrust in this
world without press agents or managers or.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
PR people or you know that there was there was
very little around you. Did you feel the same.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
Way George bestall came from Northern Ireland to Manchester United
at a very young age, so it's a little bit
different when you've got it suddenly you are on your own.
Whereas I kind of played for my hometown club for
the first eight years of my career, so.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
I was with parents, my brother, you know, we had
family all around.
Speaker 4 (12:02):
All my friends were still there, and I think that
helped me, even though I was a kind of slightly
late developer in terms of global kind of fame and
that sort of stuff, so I didn't really start making
my mark until I was in my twenties. Whereas, you know,
people like Best and even David Beckhall was well he
was there were young superstars really, you know, people like
(12:23):
Wayne Rooney, Mike Loewen, lots of players, and I was
kind of more gradual, and I think that helped me
prepare for that for a fame, but also be moving
away from home and all that sort of stuff. So
I did it at a slightly older age than most of
them do. And I think that was actually hugely beneficial
for me. So it didn't feel like a massive massive
(12:45):
change when I shifted a little bit.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
And what was it like when you were twenty four?
Where did you go? There?
Speaker 1 (12:50):
Went to Everton.
Speaker 4 (12:51):
It was a big It was a big step because
you're leaving your hometown club. And I loved less Ter.
It was my team. I'd supported them since I was
a little kid. I'd done well, I'd scored lots of
goals there. But but to trying to get build my career,
I needed to go to a kind of bigger club.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
At the time, they take care of you.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Oh they were great. It was a great place. I
was only there for a year, but.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
You had an apartment by yourself.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
I was with my then first wife.
Speaker 4 (13:18):
We didn't get more until the next year. But yeah,
so we went up together.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Did Okay, she's a good cup. Michelle's a good cup. Yeah.
I didn't cook down, No, I didn't cook until eight
years ago.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
You did you have a sense of of health and
food and sport?
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Were you guided about the kind of foods that would
be better for you to perform?
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Not as much as we should have been.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
I think nowadays that's it's one of the great changes
in football, is the nutrition.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Side of things. I think it's a gradual change.
Speaker 4 (13:50):
I think an understanding of what feeds the body, and
more professional outlets to more money coming into the game
so they could afford you know, clubs Now, the staff
around football clubs, they are extraordinary. When I played, you'd
get you'd have a coach, a manager, a coach, maybe
another one other coach, goalkeeping coach. Possibly you'll have a
(14:11):
physio and they some clubs have a doctor and that
was about it.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Now there's there's.
Speaker 4 (14:17):
There's probably are five people just do a nutrition alone.
They'll have cooks every day cooking them food after training.
In all those kinds of things. It's changed dramatically. When
I was like, what you're doing for lunch, Well we're
going down the pub for.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
A pint and a pie before a game?
Speaker 4 (14:31):
Yeah, well no, not before a game, after train enough,
although all those some players, maybe some players maybe.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
Do you know what what what would be I mean
for you as an athlete if you knew we had
a game, what would you have for breakfast?
Speaker 3 (14:46):
And what would you have a lunch?
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Well, you wouldn't have lunch and breakfast.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
Probably a few playing at three o'clock, so you probably
basically have like a brunch at eleven o'clock or stuff.
I don't actually know what they do pretty much now
because it used to be what you said, right, you
need some carbs and you for the energy and stuff
like that. But I think most of their diets is
very healthy. If you look at football as they're all
ripped now, like you know, all these abs everywhere. When
(15:10):
I first started playing, we were told, whatever you do,
don't don't do any upper body weight work because you're
completely you know, you'll be all stiff and warding on
the pitch and you won't be as agile, absolute poppy,
complete nonsense. So you never saw players particularly kind of
ripped and muscular in my day that you do now,
because that's that was the thinking.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
I rarely talk about alcohol, you know, because this is
mostly about food. But I was wondering about how do
you combine discipline with pleasure because we've seen people like
George Best. How do you combine being a twenty four
year old with being somebody wanted to party, wanted to socialize, very.
Speaker 3 (15:49):
Handsome with being.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
They are and how do you combine that figure with pleasure.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
I wasn't there.
Speaker 4 (15:59):
I was never a big drinker. I didn't drink, I
didn't go down. I wasn't one of those that went
down the pub after training, unlike some. So I kind
of looked after myself. I was very driven, very motivated,
very ambitious to do better. So I tried to give
myself the best chance. Yes, I'd like to night out
with it with the best of them, but it's like
(16:19):
most players, the vast majority of players understood that. Even then,
you know, it's not really a great combination drinking loads
of bikes and then playing in a couple of days
time I hadn't manager called John Wallace, so I was
so terrified of that. He kind of stopped me doing
any of that nonsense.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
What about when you went to Barcelona?
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Wilson was fabulous.
Speaker 4 (16:40):
It was a great experience, a wonderful place to live.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
Was it the first experience in a foreign city or
had I'd.
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Been on holidays?
Speaker 4 (16:48):
I've been lots of holidays, but it was the first
time i'd ever you know, I didn't really contemplate going
to live abroad, but then the opportunity came.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
You go by yourself, or got married just before we went.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
So I played the World Cup in eighty six in Mexico,
came back, got married, went on honeymoon, went straight to
Barcelona from.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
There, and so the two of you had an apartment there.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
We had a yeah.
Speaker 4 (17:13):
We actually the first four months we thought we so, yeah,
this is it superstardom and stuff that, you know, We'll
go up and they'll put us in a like a
luxurious hotel, penthouse suite and all that stuff. And we
actually got there and we checked in this hotel which
was a four star hotel, and we were given our
room key, and we had like we had an entire
(17:35):
world with us, like loads of cases and stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
And we went in and we got in the room
that is.
Speaker 4 (17:41):
Actually smaller than this room we're in there, fairly private,
nice room, but it was a nice room.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
But so we got in this room. We didn't know enough.
Speaker 4 (17:50):
I had to buy the room. I had to pay
for the room next door to put our cases in.
And Mark Hughes was a player at Manchester United, that's
well that time, he'd just been bought and he came
and arrived at the same time and me and arrived
in the same day and he came down and knocked
on my door and he said, I'm just checking your
(18:11):
rooms as shit as mine. And it was like this
really brown, dank, dark place. And we ended up in
there for four months. But eventually we got in a
nice villa and we had three amazing years.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
And it was three years. How did that affect your
food and eating?
Speaker 1 (18:28):
And I mean, I love the food there?
Speaker 3 (18:30):
Why did you love?
Speaker 1 (18:32):
I loved the fresh fish that was always available.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
I mean it's obviously you know, you're living in a
port there and some great restaurants. I loved tapas. I
love pie here the beach. I mean, we had an
amazing lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
We get up.
Speaker 4 (18:47):
I'd get up in the morning about nine something, go
to the ground. We'd train for you know, a couple
of hours. By lunchtime you had done, I'd come home.
We're jumping the car, go to the beach club Castela Fells.
We'd have like a seafood and a play here on
the beach. We'd leave about five, get home about six o'clock,
(19:11):
have a yester for two or three hours, and then
go out for dinner, which you couldn't.
Speaker 1 (19:15):
Get in a restaurant.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Ten eleven twelve o'clock at night, because if you went
to a restaurant in Barcelona back then, it's changed a bit.
Now it's still late, but nothing like as nat as
it used to be. If you went to a restaurant
before ten o'clock, they'd either be empty or closed. But
actually they what they do is they break up their sleep.
So you then go home at one two o'clock in
(19:38):
the morning, sleep for five six hours and then it's
it's totally different.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
It was.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
It was totally different, but it was.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
It didn't take a long getting used to it really does.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
Did you have kids at the time.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
No, even better, it's good.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
We interes party in London. We invited the mayor of Barcelona.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
He was in town and.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
He said, I can't come for the party. I'll come
a little bit later. And so he didn't show up
by you know, eleven o'clock, and so we thought, okay,
it's not going and went to bed. At two point
thirty in the morning, the doorbell rang and he was like, expecting.
Speaker 3 (20:17):
The party, I'm here. I ran downstairs. So they just left.
You know, it's a party just ended. It's a totally different.
Speaker 4 (20:26):
It's like living on with on a different time. Yeah,
and it's only an hour different.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
But did you do it? What a game night then?
So when you were when you were well.
Speaker 4 (20:36):
Sometimes the games sometimes you play kickoff will be like
nine o'clock at night quite often, you know. And Sundays
you used play at five o'clock. That was that was
kind of their Saturday at three, So they often play
on Sundays at five.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Why does football games start at three? Is there a reason?
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (20:54):
Yeah, lunch?
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Well, yeah, I suppose. I don't know. That's a good question.
I don't know who came up with three o'clock. I'm
going to find out.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
You find out because I come past Chelsea every time
I work on a Saturday or whatever. You know, you
could just always know that between Fulham playing or Chelsea playing,
then it's always three o'clock.
Speaker 4 (21:17):
Well genuine it is, unless they're on TV then they'll
move the schedule. But yeah, I don't know why the
three o'clock came start. Probably before darkness. Maybe they wanted
to play early enough before they had really good floodlights
and stuff. Although in the winter it's still dark before,
so I don't know how that works. But I need
to find out. Why do we kick off at three o'clock,
(21:40):
there'll be a reason.
Speaker 3 (21:41):
Maybe, Okay, the audience.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
You talk about the exhilaration of an audience, what happens
when you score a goal.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
Scoring a goal is it is the one thing that
I probably miss about that feeling. It's like it's really
hard to describe. It's like just an explosion of different
emotions of joy, of relief, of happiness and stuff. And
the reason it's I think it's so special and the
(22:12):
reason that football is supposed so special is that the
value of a goal is so so important because you know,
you can you know, in America, I go, for example,
and they used to used to go, but you you know,
you're only you can have a game that.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
There there's no goals or there's only one goal.
Speaker 4 (22:28):
And I said, yes, but that that is the magic
of football because it is so important. So you have
a moment. And it's the same for fans watching when
their seam scores. You know, it's like it's amazing because
you know how significant a goal can be. So when
you're the person that's actually scoring that goal, it's like
it's like cheering for your team, except it's you that's
(22:49):
doing it. And there's nothing like it, and other conversations
with that, and Cheerer and Michael Owen proper goal scorers,
and and funny enough, I suppose to Andy Cole the
other day and we were talking about the same things,
that there's nothing nothing in life, not even eating at
the River caf. I'm really sorry, however, wonderfully, how wonderfully always.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, but we might you know, fix that we're going
to get you there. I'm definitely But you know what,
I always when I watch football, and I do watch football,
I do watch it that I remember thinking that it
is the only time you see men showing so much
affection to each other physical hugging and kissing. There are
all these guys and they're publicly like in each other's
(23:34):
arms and that kind.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Of very metrosexual.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
Well it just but it was beautiful.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
But what about the other side of that, when you're missical,
when you don't do you feel the.
Speaker 4 (23:45):
Hostil it's rubbish, it's it's a horrible There.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
Is the downside of that.
Speaker 4 (23:55):
There is Well, that's it and that's why scory makes
that's why when you do do it, because it's you know,
it's obviously the most important thing. And there are days
where you will be rubbish, but it's how you deal
with that. I was always looking. I didn't get too
carried away when things were going well. It's kind of
how I am. I've got a very kind of stable
demeanor and stuff, and I don't get over excited when
(24:17):
things are going well.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
But I didn't get down when they weren't.
Speaker 4 (24:20):
And I think you're either like that you're on So
I didn't pressure and that kind of thing didn't really
worry me at all.
Speaker 2 (24:34):
If you like listening to Ruthie's Table for would you
please make sure to rate and review the podcast on
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get
your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
What we're seeing now is also a kind of true
unity in terms of the politics of sport. You know,
I experienced it in the Mexican Olympics, which because I'm
quite old, the nineteen sixty eight when they did the
plat power and you saw a sport becoming politicized. And
we've seen it in America with you know, racism on
(25:18):
the field. Do you feel that that did you have?
Do you think that also, like food has become more
more now that.
Speaker 4 (25:25):
I think it has and I think there are a
variety of reasons for that. I think that you know,
you go back to this happened once to twice in
the Olympics, didn't it happen you know, in Germany way back?
But I think it's I think it's more the fact
that players now, in whatever sport have you know, big
players have big platforms, social media.
Speaker 1 (25:47):
I think that's made a huge difference.
Speaker 4 (25:49):
Pretty much all sport now is televised, whereas that certainly
wasn't the case. So I think yes, and I'm actually
really proud of a lot of our plays young, you
know people Marcus Rashford's you know, I mean it's come
to a footballer to insist that kids get fed at school,
which seems a bit but amazing what he did. You know,
we've seen, you know, lots of players standing up against racism.
(26:12):
You know, Jordan Henderson got all the captions together during
the COVID thing and did you know they've become really public.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Now.
Speaker 4 (26:18):
I understand why some don't want to do that because
I think you've you've got to be prepared for criticism
if you do that, because people say, stick to football.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
It's you know, all this nonsense.
Speaker 4 (26:29):
So you've got to be kind of strong of mind
and be able to take flat and thick skinned. But
I've really been proud of our young footballers. I think,
you know, you take this young the England squad. Now
you know, they're kind of just a lovely bunch of
characters and they've brought a really good feeling back to
our game.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
You should also be proud of yourself because you've taken
stance that, as I said in the introduction, that are
bold and brave. We could talk about the experience your
head most recently or other ones that you feel that
you had to take a stand.
Speaker 4 (27:05):
Yeah, it's just something that is, you know, a couple
of issues. You know, people say you should stay out
of politics and stuff. I don't really see them necessarily.
Is just political issues. I think the humanitarian issues that
I take a stand for and I always well, I
have done, and I think I've changed as a person as.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
I've got older.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
I think when I was young, I was cold, I
was driven nothing, I never thought about things like that.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
What changed for me really was social media because I
got involved.
Speaker 4 (27:33):
You know, I got onto Twitter and I quite enjoyed it,
and I grew a big following.
Speaker 3 (27:36):
Something like nine million.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Just under that. I mean, it's a lot of people.
Speaker 4 (27:44):
So I mean, if you've got a platform like that,
you know, I just think what a waste it will
be not to use it for what I think. That
not everyone will agree, obviously, I understand that what I
think is to use it as a power for good.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
And you know, I've always felt.
Speaker 4 (28:03):
Quite strongly about you know, human beings not being kind
enough to each other everywhere, you know, particularly this kind
of tribality that we have, and you know, it's them
and us, and they're foreigners and they come in here,
and it's like we need people coming from all different
parts of the world. And how you know, put yourself
(28:24):
in a situation where it's say it was London and
suddenly we were being you know, bomb like they are
perhaps now in Gaza or something that kind of situation,
And imagine you had to try somehow to flee home,
and you jumped in a kind of very risky boat
and you travel around half the world and eventually arrive
at country and nobody wants you. No country can have everybody,
(28:46):
you can't, you know, you have to have a various way,
you know, but have some safe routs and stuff. But
it's just the lack of empathy that I find hard
to believe for people that have imagine what how desperate
things have got to be to you know, jump in
a dingy that risk your life and your life of
(29:07):
your children to seek kind of sanctuary somewhere and then
not to be well received. And it's I just I
find it hard to understand. And I think it's incomprehensible
that you I understand people some people don't have any
empathy at all for anyone. I would have been ashamed
of myself if I if I didn't didn't at least
(29:27):
take a stance about something that I felt quite strongly about.
Speaker 3 (29:30):
And what was that like for you? What did you?
Speaker 2 (29:33):
How did you find your you know, your fellow athletes
and you had people who really supported you?
Speaker 4 (29:39):
Oh yeah, joined there was one, you know, when I
responded to somebody's tweet that was having a pop at
me and I, you know, just talked about something and
then it kind of escalated a little bit, and then
it was really done by the Daily Mail because they're
front page.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
That took what I said completely out of context.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
And then, you know, we do have a tendency to
for some inexplicable and worry about the Daily Mail. So
it kind of led from there and it inspired a
little bit out of control.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
But the support I had from my my I.
Speaker 4 (30:10):
Call them teammates because we once a football are always
a footballer. But it was actually one of the most
emotional things that I just found it.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
It was incredible.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
I shed a tear in the back of a black
taxi when Ian Right and Alan Shearer supported me, and
then everyone followed to you know, you know you've got mates,
and you know you like mates, and you have the
bands and stuff, and even a couple of days before
it happened, we have a little group chat with Ian
Right Alan Shearer and I said to them, I said,
I've got a feeling that might take me off the
(30:42):
show and Ian Wright said, oh, if they do that,
there's no way I'm doing the show. And I think
it's one thing saying that, but then actually to follow
that through and you learn then that you know they
are real mates, you know, and you learn a little
bit about what they think about you. And I think
that for me was one of the most amazing things
that I've gone through in my life. The support side
(31:04):
of it. The other side, I could definitely live without.
Having twenty odd journeys outside my front door for about
five six days was weird.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
But you have taken refugees into your home, you have
spoken out. You are a person that gives comfort to
so many people. So I suppose my last question to you,
and thank you so much for being here, is that
if you do go to food for comfort, if you
need comfort and you need something to eat, is there
a food that you would go to where that kind
(31:34):
of comfort.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
It depends on which time of year it is. But
let's say it's winter.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Cottage pie, ah, cottage pie, debscribe a cottage pie.
Speaker 3 (31:44):
There might be people in California who don't say.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
I'm terribly sorry.
Speaker 4 (31:48):
Well, there's two types of pie, one called cottage pie,
one called the shepherd's pie.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
One is lamb mince, and one is beef mints.
Speaker 4 (31:55):
Shepherd's pie is obviously Lamb's mints because the shepherd. So
if ever you get confused, that's the way to remember
around it. Coottash pies with minced beef. I don't know
why I've always liked it. My mum used to do it.
It's one of the reasons probably, And it's one of
the things I wanted to learn to cook, and then
I cook it a lot. But it's basically mince and mash,
(32:15):
typically a bit of Worcester sauce that you put in it. Yeah,
and it's like with a layer of mashed potato and
top a bit of cheesy, crispy top. I mean, I
love cooking, and it's great because my boys come around.
They like my cooking and they come around. It keeps
them coming around their adults now obviously, but you know, Dad,
are you in tonight bit of dinner?
Speaker 1 (32:34):
All right? Yeah, I'm going to do it. Yeah, so fine,
but yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Well we're going to get you to come and spend
a day in the River Cafe or maybe more than
a day.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
Yeah, where do you think I'm expensive much? Sixteen for my.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
Mom play that game of cards. Thank you very much. Absolutely,
Thank you, Joan.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Thank you for listening to Ruthie's table for in partnership
with Montclair
You are listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
My brother Michael Elias, is a writer and director of movies,
tells me that when even a world famous actor comes
onto a set, no one on the crew bats an eye.
The only exception as if the visitor is an athlete.
Maybe it's because everyone thinks, if pressed, they could act,
or sing or dance, but never run a race, ski
(00:27):
down hill or kick a ball into a net.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
When Gary Lineker, one of.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
The great footballers of our time, walks into the River Cafe,
everyone stops what they're doing, and some months ago I
stopped what I was doing after reading his brave defense
of refugees landing in Britain and his pleas for empathy
compassion for people in peril. Gary is never silenced on
issues he feels strongly about.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
This sense of justice runs deep.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
He's one of the very few footballers never to have
received a red or yellow cat, consistent with who he is, principled,
respectful and fair. We're also both in the world of podcasts,
although there is no comparison when his company, Goldhanger, has
eighteen million Gary and I also share the world of
(01:16):
food and This is not the first time a footballer
has stepped on my turf. There's nothing Beckham loves more
than cooking. Ian Wright has his own food brand. Look
at Gary's Instagram and you'll see as many photographs of
what he's cooking as the goals he's analyzing. On Match
of the Day, Gary has been in the kitchen with
(01:37):
Joseph Travelli making potato yaki with tomato sauce.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
So the nyaki, what do you love about it?
Speaker 4 (01:43):
I love yoki. I think it's quite versatile as well.
You can kind of make it crispy and bake it
and stuff as well. But it just works with tomatoes,
thank you, doesn't it. I think I always always go
to tomatoes with yaki.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
It just was perfect because I was in actually last
week and I was taken to this quite fancy restaurant
and I never do this.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
I never changed something. But they had potato and yaki.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
With asparagus and for shoot, punchetta, and it was quite
quite complicated, and I just said, do you mind if
I have it with tomato, and it was so much better.
I saw the other ones and there was something we
do it, but we do it with other we.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Do it with you can do, but it's never as
good as it.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
I mean, there's something about yeah, Italian tomatoes as well.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
Yeah, do you cook a lot of Italian? Do you
go for Italian food?
Speaker 1 (02:33):
I cook a yeah, I do a lot of Italian food.
Speaker 4 (02:35):
Everyone just done there. I suppose it's it's kind of
one of the great cuisines. But I love cooking Indian
as well, and as well as kind of British basics
and stuff. So yeah, a variety of different things, but
I would say to cook probably Italian and Indiana my
favorite too.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
Have you been to India?
Speaker 1 (02:55):
No, It's on my bucket list actually.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
And so let's go back to growing up, because you
were born and I was.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Born in Lesti, and what was the food culture like there.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
Well, my dad was a market trader and he's a fruitter,
so he'd sell fruit. So he worked hard, get a
you know, three four in the morning, go to the
wholesale market by the fruit.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Sell it all day.
Speaker 4 (03:16):
But what you sell it was an outdoor market, the
biggest outdoor market in Europe at the time, and in Europe.
Yeah it's really well really yeah, well exactly. There were
also fish traders. There was a fish, you know, a
fish mumbry kind of thing, and there was there was
a meat place. So at the end of the week
he'd always kind of give them a big basket fruit
and then they give him like a nice piece of
(03:38):
meat or a haliburt. Used to he loved halibur and
so we'd get like that kind of thing and eat
on a on a Friday and a Saturday, would eat
kind of really amazing stuff because they used to do
these swamp things. So yeah, so I kind of grew
up with food in that sense. Didn't go out very
often but occasionally.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
It wasn't a wholesale market was it didn't get distributed
to the rest of Brittain.
Speaker 4 (04:00):
You're talking about this bester market. Leicester's now famous for
its football team, having won the Premier League. Obviously, in fact,
people suddenly started saying Leicester.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Properly, how do you say it properly? Well, Leicester?
Speaker 4 (04:15):
It was all Leicester, particularly in America and stuff. It
was always and suddenly people saying the name because you always.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Now because Leicester won the league.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
With the biggest sporting miracle ever, everyone knows how.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
To say it.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
Does your family still live there?
Speaker 4 (04:31):
The only distant family now my my mom and dad
passed away eight seven, eight years ago now, so so
I don't go back there as much, apart from the
occasional time to watch watch Leicester play if I'm.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Not working, which so have you had the ingredients of
fruit and vegetables and fish meat, but I didn't cook.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
A good cook.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
Tell me about her. What was her background? Where did
she come from?
Speaker 4 (04:57):
She actually born in a place called Sherringham which is
in Norfolk on the coaster, and moved to Leicester when
she was I think it was about ten ten or eleven,
and she was a hairdresser.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Be comes mom was a hairdresser.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Really, Yeah, there you go, she must be a football
thing maybe before.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
That's a lot of data.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Yeah, you can then come to a conclusion that two
footballers had bombs were hairdressing.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yeah. But she was a good cook, love cooking.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, so she work all day and then as.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Well when I was young, and then she kind of
stopped hairdressing.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
And my dad used to have a card school.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
The card school a girl called Kaluki playing cards as
he was a gambler, and they used to have like
five or six guys in that used to come to
our house, either on a Sunday, sometimes on a Monday,
but they'd start at like six o'clock in the evening,
and my mom would cook for everyone every night, and
she could get a little pound and out of the
pot every time they had a it was a kids
(06:03):
he going on all night. But I'd go to bed,
you know, because I'd have school on Monday morning, and
then i'd wake up in the morning get ready for school.
They're still playing, like yeah, eight, nine, ten o'clock in
the morning. Sometimes they'd go unbroken for thirty six hours. Yeah, honestly,
and my mom would constantly be supplying food all through
the night, and yeah, amazing.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
You know my dad.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
I grew up in upstate New York in a small town,
and my father played poker.
Speaker 3 (06:29):
Every Thursday night.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
They played poker as well sometimes.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And every Friday morning I'd come to go before I
went to school, there would be a note saying, dear Ruthie,
I won last night. Here's five dollars, Ruthie, I won
last night. He went every week and they'd always be
like five dollars or ten dollars, and then it was
his funeral. I went to his you know, when he
died I went to his funeral and it was like
a kind of quaker'sh funeral. Everybody spoke and this man
(06:53):
got up and he said, you know, fred Elias was
one of the greatest guys they ever knew.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
But he never won a game of poker. That was
really sweet.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
He did that every Friday.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
That's not my dad, but every day.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
So what would she cook? What did your mom cook
for you? What were her dishes like? Do you remember?
Speaker 4 (07:15):
Like most mothers, she'd cook a good spaghetti, bilonnaise, really
good with fish because we get a lot of fish
from the from the market.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
She'd do a really good roast as well.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
My kind either all of them, you know, douse your
father ever cook?
Speaker 1 (07:33):
I can't remember him cooking.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
And did you ever go in the kitchen? Did you
ever know?
Speaker 4 (07:37):
I wish I had. And I think that's the one
thing we fail our kids on. I think that should
be an absolute must learn at school. I mean they
used to offer it all the time that you still
can do a bit of cooking at school. But it's
a it's a life scale, it's a life you can
be really passionate about it, you know, rather than making
(07:58):
kids that are not very good at maths. Yes, you've
got to get your basic numbers and stuff, and reading
is really important, I think.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
But the next thing after those two for me has
to be like cooking.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
You know.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
That's what's one thing we all do forever is eat.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
The River Cafe is excited and June eighth we're opening
the River Cafe Cafe. Come for a morning Briochian cappuccino,
a plate of seasonal antipasity on the terrace, or an
ice cream or a peratubo in the sun. We can't
wait to open and we cannot wait to welcome you.
(08:46):
You came from this home in Leicester with your mother cooking,
your father playing cards, your badly dinners. Tell us about
the football when you when sport came into your life.
Speaker 4 (08:55):
Well, I came into my life way before I can
remember from you know, from pretty much that's where I wore.
It wasn't a specific days. Doesn't work like that football, now,
you know.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
I grew up playing in the garden my brother.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
We just kicked up all around all the time, obviously
reasonably good at even at nine ten eleven I was
playing and scoring like loads of goals.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
So I just went from there and I was spotted
by Leicester when I was about twelve. It's funny.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
My dad's market store was a family of generational business,
so the.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Big grandfather grandfather and his father before that. So yeah,
my granddad.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
Used to come and watchers play football everywhere. We were
quite a well known family in Leicester because of the
market store. And my granddad was watching me play one
Sunday morning and the guy called racial was there was
Leicester City's chief scout and he my grandad knew everyone,
(09:49):
knew everyone. He said, oh who you watching? He said,
I'm watching a little center forward up there. I was
tiny in those days, and he went, oh, that's my grandson.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
And they took me on.
Speaker 4 (09:58):
I trained two three nights a week at Leicester and
then saturdays as well for four or five years, and
then I got taken on.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
When did you leave the comfort of home?
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Not until I was twenty four. It was funny.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
When I first joined Leicester, I joined as an apprentice
and I was paid sixteen pounds a week, but they
bought an extra five in an envelope for my mom
because because loads of the kids there that came were
in digs, so the food was provided for them. So
they said, well, because you know, you don't get the
(10:31):
luxury of getting free food or slipping a fiver for
your mom. So I'd always give it to my mum,
but she'd never take it a bit like you.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
You sh'd always give it me back. She's I don't
want you, I don't want your money. So I was on.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Twenty one quid a week, not sixteen quid a week,
which is a bonus.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
So you were at home, so you had protection around
you in terms of your comfort of home. But what
about protection for being suddenly when you found fame. I'll
just say that I once this is I think I
might have told this before, but one of my programs
I always remember was Michael Parkinson interviewing David Beckham and
George Best, and George Best was you know. They were
(11:10):
on the sofa together and when he asked Beckham a question,
Beckham said, you know, I'm in the presence of one
of the great heroes of my life. I think, really
I don't want to talk. You should just talk to him,
you know. And what they did discuss was the you know,
the difference between now and then.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
You know.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
The Best said, he just came from a simple life
in the home and suddenly he was thrust in this
world without press agents or managers or.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
PR people or you know that there was there was
very little around you. Did you feel the same.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
Way George bestall came from Northern Ireland to Manchester United
at a very young age, so it's a little bit
different when you've got it suddenly you are on your own.
Whereas I kind of played for my hometown club for
the first eight years of my career, so.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
I was with parents, my brother, you know, we had
family all around.
Speaker 4 (12:02):
All my friends were still there, and I think that
helped me, even though I was a kind of slightly
late developer in terms of global kind of fame and
that sort of stuff, so I didn't really start making
my mark until I was in my twenties. Whereas, you know,
people like Best and even David Beckhall was well he
was there were young superstars really, you know, people like
(12:23):
Wayne Rooney, Mike Loewen, lots of players, and I was
kind of more gradual, and I think that helped me
prepare for that for a fame, but also be moving
away from home and all that sort of stuff. So
I did it at a slightly older age than most of
them do. And I think that was actually hugely beneficial
for me. So it didn't feel like a massive massive
(12:45):
change when I shifted a little bit.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
And what was it like when you were twenty four?
Where did you go? There?
Speaker 1 (12:50):
Went to Everton.
Speaker 4 (12:51):
It was a big It was a big step because
you're leaving your hometown club. And I loved less Ter.
It was my team. I'd supported them since I was
a little kid. I'd done well, I'd scored lots of
goals there. But but to trying to get build my career,
I needed to go to a kind of bigger club.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
At the time, they take care of you.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Oh they were great. It was a great place. I
was only there for a year, but.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
You had an apartment by yourself.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
I was with my then first wife.
Speaker 4 (13:18):
We didn't get more until the next year. But yeah,
so we went up together.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Did Okay, she's a good cup. Michelle's a good cup. Yeah.
I didn't cook down, No, I didn't cook until eight
years ago.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
You did you have a sense of of health and
food and sport?
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Were you guided about the kind of foods that would
be better for you to perform?
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Not as much as we should have been.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
I think nowadays that's it's one of the great changes
in football, is the nutrition.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Side of things. I think it's a gradual change.
Speaker 4 (13:50):
I think an understanding of what feeds the body, and
more professional outlets to more money coming into the game
so they could afford you know, clubs Now, the staff
around football clubs, they are extraordinary. When I played, you'd
get you'd have a coach, a manager, a coach, maybe
another one other coach, goalkeeping coach. Possibly you'll have a
(14:11):
physio and they some clubs have a doctor and that
was about it.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Now there's there's.
Speaker 4 (14:17):
There's probably are five people just do a nutrition alone.
They'll have cooks every day cooking them food after training.
In all those kinds of things. It's changed dramatically. When
I was like, what you're doing for lunch, Well we're
going down the pub for.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
A pint and a pie before a game?
Speaker 4 (14:31):
Yeah, well no, not before a game, after train enough,
although all those some players, maybe some players maybe.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
Do you know what what what would be I mean
for you as an athlete if you knew we had
a game, what would you have for breakfast?
Speaker 3 (14:46):
And what would you have a lunch?
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Well, you wouldn't have lunch and breakfast.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
Probably a few playing at three o'clock, so you probably
basically have like a brunch at eleven o'clock or stuff.
I don't actually know what they do pretty much now
because it used to be what you said, right, you
need some carbs and you for the energy and stuff
like that. But I think most of their diets is
very healthy. If you look at football as they're all
ripped now, like you know, all these abs everywhere. When
(15:10):
I first started playing, we were told, whatever you do,
don't don't do any upper body weight work because you're
completely you know, you'll be all stiff and warding on
the pitch and you won't be as agile, absolute poppy,
complete nonsense. So you never saw players particularly kind of
ripped and muscular in my day that you do now,
because that's that was the thinking.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
I rarely talk about alcohol, you know, because this is
mostly about food. But I was wondering about how do
you combine discipline with pleasure because we've seen people like
George Best. How do you combine being a twenty four
year old with being somebody wanted to party, wanted to socialize, very.
Speaker 3 (15:49):
Handsome with being.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
They are and how do you combine that figure with pleasure.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
I wasn't there.
Speaker 4 (15:59):
I was never a big drinker. I didn't drink, I
didn't go down. I wasn't one of those that went
down the pub after training, unlike some. So I kind
of looked after myself. I was very driven, very motivated,
very ambitious to do better. So I tried to give
myself the best chance. Yes, I'd like to night out
with it with the best of them, but it's like
(16:19):
most players, the vast majority of players understood that. Even then,
you know, it's not really a great combination drinking loads
of bikes and then playing in a couple of days
time I hadn't manager called John Wallace, so I was
so terrified of that. He kind of stopped me doing
any of that nonsense.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
What about when you went to Barcelona?
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Wilson was fabulous.
Speaker 4 (16:40):
It was a great experience, a wonderful place to live.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
Was it the first experience in a foreign city or
had I'd.
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Been on holidays?
Speaker 4 (16:48):
I've been lots of holidays, but it was the first
time i'd ever you know, I didn't really contemplate going
to live abroad, but then the opportunity came.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
You go by yourself, or got married just before we went.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
So I played the World Cup in eighty six in Mexico,
came back, got married, went on honeymoon, went straight to
Barcelona from.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
There, and so the two of you had an apartment there.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
We had a yeah.
Speaker 4 (17:13):
We actually the first four months we thought we so, yeah,
this is it superstardom and stuff that, you know, We'll
go up and they'll put us in a like a
luxurious hotel, penthouse suite and all that stuff. And we
actually got there and we checked in this hotel which
was a four star hotel, and we were given our
room key, and we had like we had an entire
(17:35):
world with us, like loads of cases and stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
And we went in and we got in the room
that is.
Speaker 4 (17:41):
Actually smaller than this room we're in there, fairly private,
nice room, but it was a nice room.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
But so we got in this room. We didn't know enough.
Speaker 4 (17:50):
I had to buy the room. I had to pay
for the room next door to put our cases in.
And Mark Hughes was a player at Manchester United, that's
well that time, he'd just been bought and he came
and arrived at the same time and me and arrived
in the same day and he came down and knocked
on my door and he said, I'm just checking your
(18:11):
rooms as shit as mine. And it was like this
really brown, dank, dark place. And we ended up in
there for four months. But eventually we got in a
nice villa and we had three amazing years.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
And it was three years. How did that affect your
food and eating?
Speaker 1 (18:28):
And I mean, I love the food there?
Speaker 3 (18:30):
Why did you love?
Speaker 1 (18:32):
I loved the fresh fish that was always available.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
I mean it's obviously you know, you're living in a
port there and some great restaurants. I loved tapas. I
love pie here the beach. I mean, we had an
amazing lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
We get up.
Speaker 4 (18:47):
I'd get up in the morning about nine something, go
to the ground. We'd train for you know, a couple
of hours. By lunchtime you had done, I'd come home.
We're jumping the car, go to the beach club Castela Fells.
We'd have like a seafood and a play here on
the beach. We'd leave about five, get home about six o'clock,
(19:11):
have a yester for two or three hours, and then
go out for dinner, which you couldn't.
Speaker 1 (19:15):
Get in a restaurant.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Ten eleven twelve o'clock at night, because if you went
to a restaurant in Barcelona back then, it's changed a bit.
Now it's still late, but nothing like as nat as
it used to be. If you went to a restaurant
before ten o'clock, they'd either be empty or closed. But
actually they what they do is they break up their sleep.
So you then go home at one two o'clock in
(19:38):
the morning, sleep for five six hours and then it's
it's totally different.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
It was.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
It was totally different, but it was.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
It didn't take a long getting used to it really does.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
Did you have kids at the time.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
No, even better, it's good.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
We interes party in London. We invited the mayor of Barcelona.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
He was in town and.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
He said, I can't come for the party. I'll come
a little bit later. And so he didn't show up
by you know, eleven o'clock, and so we thought, okay,
it's not going and went to bed. At two point
thirty in the morning, the doorbell rang and he was like, expecting.
Speaker 3 (20:17):
The party, I'm here. I ran downstairs. So they just left.
You know, it's a party just ended. It's a totally different.
Speaker 4 (20:26):
It's like living on with on a different time. Yeah,
and it's only an hour different.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
But did you do it? What a game night then?
So when you were when you were well.
Speaker 4 (20:36):
Sometimes the games sometimes you play kickoff will be like
nine o'clock at night quite often, you know. And Sundays
you used play at five o'clock. That was that was
kind of their Saturday at three, So they often play
on Sundays at five.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Why does football games start at three? Is there a reason?
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (20:54):
Yeah, lunch?
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Well, yeah, I suppose. I don't know. That's a good question.
I don't know who came up with three o'clock. I'm
going to find out.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
You find out because I come past Chelsea every time
I work on a Saturday or whatever. You know, you
could just always know that between Fulham playing or Chelsea playing,
then it's always three o'clock.
Speaker 4 (21:17):
Well genuine it is, unless they're on TV then they'll
move the schedule. But yeah, I don't know why the
three o'clock came start. Probably before darkness. Maybe they wanted
to play early enough before they had really good floodlights
and stuff. Although in the winter it's still dark before,
so I don't know how that works. But I need
to find out. Why do we kick off at three o'clock,
(21:40):
there'll be a reason.
Speaker 3 (21:41):
Maybe, Okay, the audience.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
You talk about the exhilaration of an audience, what happens
when you score a goal.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
Scoring a goal is it is the one thing that
I probably miss about that feeling. It's like it's really
hard to describe. It's like just an explosion of different
emotions of joy, of relief, of happiness and stuff. And
the reason it's I think it's so special and the
(22:12):
reason that football is supposed so special is that the
value of a goal is so so important because you know,
you can you know, in America, I go, for example,
and they used to used to go, but you you know,
you're only you can have a game that.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
There there's no goals or there's only one goal.
Speaker 4 (22:28):
And I said, yes, but that that is the magic
of football because it is so important. So you have
a moment. And it's the same for fans watching when
their seam scores. You know, it's like it's amazing because
you know how significant a goal can be. So when
you're the person that's actually scoring that goal, it's like
it's like cheering for your team, except it's you that's
(22:49):
doing it. And there's nothing like it, and other conversations
with that, and Cheerer and Michael Owen proper goal scorers,
and and funny enough, I suppose to Andy Cole the
other day and we were talking about the same things,
that there's nothing nothing in life, not even eating at
the River caf. I'm really sorry, however, wonderfully, how wonderfully always.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, but we might you know, fix that we're going
to get you there. I'm definitely But you know what,
I always when I watch football, and I do watch football,
I do watch it that I remember thinking that it
is the only time you see men showing so much
affection to each other physical hugging and kissing. There are
all these guys and they're publicly like in each other's
(23:34):
arms and that kind.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Of very metrosexual.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
Well it just but it was beautiful.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
But what about the other side of that, when you're missical,
when you don't do you feel the.
Speaker 4 (23:45):
Hostil it's rubbish, it's it's a horrible There.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
Is the downside of that.
Speaker 4 (23:55):
There is Well, that's it and that's why scory makes
that's why when you do do it, because it's you know,
it's obviously the most important thing. And there are days
where you will be rubbish, but it's how you deal
with that. I was always looking. I didn't get too
carried away when things were going well. It's kind of
how I am. I've got a very kind of stable
demeanor and stuff, and I don't get over excited when
(24:17):
things are going well.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
But I didn't get down when they weren't.
Speaker 4 (24:20):
And I think you're either like that you're on So
I didn't pressure and that kind of thing didn't really
worry me at all.
Speaker 2 (24:34):
If you like listening to Ruthie's Table for would you
please make sure to rate and review the podcast on
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get
your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
What we're seeing now is also a kind of true
unity in terms of the politics of sport. You know,
I experienced it in the Mexican Olympics, which because I'm
quite old, the nineteen sixty eight when they did the
plat power and you saw a sport becoming politicized. And
we've seen it in America with you know, racism on
(25:18):
the field. Do you feel that that did you have?
Do you think that also, like food has become more
more now that.
Speaker 4 (25:25):
I think it has and I think there are a
variety of reasons for that. I think that you know,
you go back to this happened once to twice in
the Olympics, didn't it happen you know, in Germany way back?
But I think it's I think it's more the fact
that players now, in whatever sport have you know, big
players have big platforms, social media.
Speaker 1 (25:47):
I think that's made a huge difference.
Speaker 4 (25:49):
Pretty much all sport now is televised, whereas that certainly
wasn't the case. So I think yes, and I'm actually
really proud of a lot of our plays young, you
know people Marcus Rashford's you know, I mean it's come
to a footballer to insist that kids get fed at school,
which seems a bit but amazing what he did. You know,
we've seen, you know, lots of players standing up against racism.
(26:12):
You know, Jordan Henderson got all the captions together during
the COVID thing and did you know they've become really public.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Now.
Speaker 4 (26:18):
I understand why some don't want to do that because
I think you've you've got to be prepared for criticism
if you do that, because people say, stick to football.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
It's you know, all this nonsense.
Speaker 4 (26:29):
So you've got to be kind of strong of mind
and be able to take flat and thick skinned. But
I've really been proud of our young footballers. I think,
you know, you take this young the England squad. Now
you know, they're kind of just a lovely bunch of
characters and they've brought a really good feeling back to
our game.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
You should also be proud of yourself because you've taken
stance that, as I said in the introduction, that are
bold and brave. We could talk about the experience your
head most recently or other ones that you feel that
you had to take a stand.
Speaker 4 (27:05):
Yeah, it's just something that is, you know, a couple
of issues. You know, people say you should stay out
of politics and stuff. I don't really see them necessarily.
Is just political issues. I think the humanitarian issues that
I take a stand for and I always well, I
have done, and I think I've changed as a person as.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
I've got older.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
I think when I was young, I was cold, I
was driven nothing, I never thought about things like that.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
What changed for me really was social media because I
got involved.
Speaker 4 (27:33):
You know, I got onto Twitter and I quite enjoyed it,
and I grew a big following.
Speaker 3 (27:36):
Something like nine million.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Just under that. I mean, it's a lot of people.
Speaker 4 (27:44):
So I mean, if you've got a platform like that,
you know, I just think what a waste it will
be not to use it for what I think. That
not everyone will agree, obviously, I understand that what I
think is to use it as a power for good.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
And you know, I've always felt.
Speaker 4 (28:03):
Quite strongly about you know, human beings not being kind
enough to each other everywhere, you know, particularly this kind
of tribality that we have, and you know, it's them
and us, and they're foreigners and they come in here,
and it's like we need people coming from all different
parts of the world. And how you know, put yourself
(28:24):
in a situation where it's say it was London and
suddenly we were being you know, bomb like they are
perhaps now in Gaza or something that kind of situation,
And imagine you had to try somehow to flee home,
and you jumped in a kind of very risky boat
and you travel around half the world and eventually arrive
at country and nobody wants you. No country can have everybody,
(28:46):
you can't, you know, you have to have a various way,
you know, but have some safe routs and stuff. But
it's just the lack of empathy that I find hard
to believe for people that have imagine what how desperate
things have got to be to you know, jump in
a dingy that risk your life and your life of
(29:07):
your children to seek kind of sanctuary somewhere and then
not to be well received. And it's I just I
find it hard to understand. And I think it's incomprehensible
that you I understand people some people don't have any
empathy at all for anyone. I would have been ashamed
of myself if I if I didn't didn't at least
(29:27):
take a stance about something that I felt quite strongly about.
Speaker 3 (29:30):
And what was that like for you? What did you?
Speaker 2 (29:33):
How did you find your you know, your fellow athletes
and you had people who really supported you?
Speaker 4 (29:39):
Oh yeah, joined there was one, you know, when I
responded to somebody's tweet that was having a pop at
me and I, you know, just talked about something and
then it kind of escalated a little bit, and then
it was really done by the Daily Mail because they're
front page.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
That took what I said completely out of context.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
And then, you know, we do have a tendency to
for some inexplicable and worry about the Daily Mail. So
it kind of led from there and it inspired a
little bit out of control.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
But the support I had from my my I.
Speaker 4 (30:10):
Call them teammates because we once a football are always
a footballer. But it was actually one of the most
emotional things that I just found it.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
It was incredible.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
I shed a tear in the back of a black
taxi when Ian Right and Alan Shearer supported me, and
then everyone followed to you know, you know you've got mates,
and you know you like mates, and you have the
bands and stuff, and even a couple of days before
it happened, we have a little group chat with Ian
Right Alan Shearer and I said to them, I said,
I've got a feeling that might take me off the
(30:42):
show and Ian Wright said, oh, if they do that,
there's no way I'm doing the show. And I think
it's one thing saying that, but then actually to follow
that through and you learn then that you know they
are real mates, you know, and you learn a little
bit about what they think about you. And I think
that for me was one of the most amazing things
that I've gone through in my life. The support side
(31:04):
of it. The other side, I could definitely live without.
Having twenty odd journeys outside my front door for about
five six days was weird.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
But you have taken refugees into your home, you have
spoken out. You are a person that gives comfort to
so many people. So I suppose my last question to you,
and thank you so much for being here, is that
if you do go to food for comfort, if you
need comfort and you need something to eat, is there
a food that you would go to where that kind
(31:34):
of comfort.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
It depends on which time of year it is. But
let's say it's winter.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Cottage pie, ah, cottage pie, debscribe a cottage pie.
Speaker 3 (31:44):
There might be people in California who don't say.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
I'm terribly sorry.
Speaker 4 (31:48):
Well, there's two types of pie, one called cottage pie,
one called the shepherd's pie.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
One is lamb mince, and one is beef mints.
Speaker 4 (31:55):
Shepherd's pie is obviously Lamb's mints because the shepherd. So
if ever you get confused, that's the way to remember
around it. Coottash pies with minced beef. I don't know
why I've always liked it. My mum used to do it.
It's one of the reasons probably, And it's one of
the things I wanted to learn to cook, and then
I cook it a lot. But it's basically mince and mash,
(32:15):
typically a bit of Worcester sauce that you put in it. Yeah,
and it's like with a layer of mashed potato and
top a bit of cheesy, crispy top. I mean, I
love cooking, and it's great because my boys come around.
They like my cooking and they come around. It keeps
them coming around their adults now obviously, but you know, Dad,
are you in tonight bit of dinner?
Speaker 1 (32:34):
All right? Yeah, I'm going to do it. Yeah, so fine,
but yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Well we're going to get you to come and spend
a day in the River Cafe or maybe more than
a day.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
Yeah, where do you think I'm expensive much? Sixteen for my.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
Mom play that game of cards. Thank you very much. Absolutely,
Thank you, Joan.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Thank you for listening to Ruthie's table for in partnership
with Montclair
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