“It’s not lost on me why I might have won this award,” began Gary Lineker as he accepted the award for Best TV Presenter at last night’s National Television Awards. His win is an historic one – not only did he put an end to Ant and Dec’s imposing 23-year winning streak in the category, but since the award is voted for by the great unwashed rather than industry bods, Lineker has also finally proven one thing: the public are behind him.
The win was given on the back of Lineker’s last year at Match of the Day, but – though he was a competent, knowledgeable, affable presenter on the football show – Lineker knows that’s not the real reason he has ended up clutching an NTA. After all, MOTD has never won at the awards before.
Other than heated debates on the news and a flood of op-eds, this is the first time we’ve really tested the temperature on how Joe Bloggs feels about the Lineker-BBC debacle. The win is a thumbs up and a pat on the back from the public in support of his speaking out about Israel’s attack on Palestine – in spite of the BBC’s strict “no politics” rule.
At the end of May, Lineker said goodbye to Match of the Day and the BBC after 26 years on the show. On his final programme, he made another subtextual comment: “It wasn’t meant to end this way,” he said, referring to the “responsible course of action” he took by leaving the broadcast after he shared an Instagram post about Zionism featuring an illustration of a rat, a historically antisemitic token. The presenter apologised, saying he “would never consciously repost anything antisemitic”.
Lineker left the BBC earlier this year, calling his exit “the responsible course of action” (Photo: Michael Regan – The FA/The FA via Getty Images)was the straw that broke the camel’s back for BBC bosses. Lineker had been causing problems for them for the best part of two years, starting in 2023 when he was suspended for comparing the language used in the government’s new asylum policy to “Germany in the 30s”. The comment was denounced by politicians on both the left and the right, and a few months later the BBC issued new social media guidelines for its presenters – pointing to Match of the Day hosts specifically.
But Lineker didn’t fall into line. He signed open letters decrying government policies and BBC decisions; he carried on tweeting about the genocide in Palestine. It was only a matter of time before he was excavated from the BBC line-up.
square FOOTBALL Gary Lineker will not be missed on Match of the Day
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Now it seems director-general Tim Davie and his cronies have made a mistake in not backing Lineker and keeping him on the payroll. While it’s true that the BBC is beholden to standards of impartiality, this NTA win proves they were perhaps a little hasty in pushing their star presenter – who we now know is supported by the public – to jump ship. They should be kicking themselves.
ITV bosses will be breathing a sigh of relief at the news of Lineker’s NTA win. He’s set to host a new game show, The Box, on the channel and they will no doubt be hoping that he’ll bring his army of supporters along with him. But it was a risk – if the BBC were right about Lineker being outspoken and out of line, then the hire would be a colossal waste of money (his ITV pay packet hasn’t been revealed, but since he was on £1.35 million at the Beeb I’d imagine it’s a hefty sum).
But Lineker’s NTA has further reaching consequences than just TV politics. We put a lot of pressure on our presenters to be upstanding citizens, beacons of being good people and Doing the Right Thing. Yet we also need them to be neutral everymen, representative of each and every one of us. It’s a Sisyphean task given the divided world we live in.
Lineker’s win is a message to them all – to us all – that putting your head above the parapet to air your views and to speak truth to power will (eventually and after a lot of derision) be rewarded. Or in his words, it “demonstrates that it is OK to use your platform to speak up on behalf of those who have no voice”. With the public behind him, there’s no telling where Lineker and his views might end. I wonder if he fancies No 10?
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