Do I get inside info on any clubs or players? Not really. There are certain clubs that, for one reason or another, I've built up a good relationship with, but it's generally teams like Gretna and The New Saints rather than Liverpool or Chelsea. A lot of that info comes from people we meet in the week or even managers and players we've bumped into on a Friday night when we're staying in the hotel.
On other occasions, I'll rely on the pundits for that info. A lot of them still have great links with their former clubs. Matt Le Tissier never has his mobile phone switched off in the studio (which he should have, by the way). Just before last season's transfer window, James Beattie had been in tremendous form for Southampton. Matt and Beats are good friends and, during the show, Le Tiss texted him, saying, ‘We're talking about whether you're going to move or not, mate, what should I tell them?’
Later his phone bleeped and, off-camera, Matt showed me the reply, which was, ‘Tell them, “Fuck all.”’
So we get info that way, and most of the lads are still well connected. Thommo still has his links with Liverpool and chats regularly to Steven Gerrard. He'd never quote him directly, but it gives him an idea of what's going on at Anfield. Le Tiss is still in touch with Southampton. Merse has contacts here, there and everywhere, though he doesn't talk about Walsall (where he had a stab at management) that often, mainly because the fans can't stand him. Charlie is very much ‘in’ with a number of football agents, and my own agent looks after a lot of players. If I'm ever struggling for info I'll call him and say ‘Am I on the right track with this story?’ He'll ring back and say, ‘No Jeff, you're miles away.’
Do I get info that I'm privy to that I can't reveal? There have been instances. When Steve Bruce left Birmingham, we had a pretty good idea on why he went, though we couldn't mention it on air, because it happened for financial reasons. It was also a mathematical conundrum so complicated that Carol Vorderman would have struggled to understand its intricacies. But then, our info on Steve Bruce was always pretty good, because his daughter, Amy, worked on the programme. I remember she came in one morning and told us that her dad had been to see Mamma Mia the previous evening, which we gleefully reported on the show. Of course we refused to let it go. ‘Have they met their Waterloo?’ ‘Will the winner take it all?’ That sort of standard. Sadly Amy has left now. Steve can now sleep on Friday nights knowing that his best-kept secrets will remain just that.
Sometimes you'll go to a dinner or an event and bump into someone interesting. I remember being sat next to Rick Parry at a function and he was telling me about the events taking place behind the scenes at Liverpool. These details weren't for public broadcast because they were confidential, but it gave me an understanding of what was going on at Anfield. In those situations you have to remain discreet. I certainly wouldn't say, ‘Well, Rick Parry mentioned this to me the other night.’ I was told in confidence, so that's how it remains.
As you can see, it's a lot to handle. When it comes to six o'clock on a Saturday evening and the show is over, I can't remember a thing. Absolutely nothing. I guess your brain is like a sponge. It soaks up all the information, you squeeze it all out during the show, and then it's completely dry again, which means I'm absolutely rubbish at pub quizzes. People are forever inviting me, but I always tell them that I'm hopeless. They never believe me, and it's only after four or five questions that they'll realize that I really am bloody rubbish. In reality, I don't have a big library, or a towering stockpile of books and encyclopaedias. I don't have an army of researchers. I'm not a ‘statto’. I am a football fan with a few local newspapers, a laptop, a mobile phone and a Wimpy in a motorway service station. But as you can tell from my svelte figure, I hardly ever use it.
4 You Can Say That Again The Catchphrases Of Soccer Saturday
A few years ago, while buying a sandwich (from the aforementioned motorway service station café in fact), I was approached by a group of Forest fans who wanted to talk about The Good Doctor, or Kenny Deuchar, the one time Gretna and Northampton striker who was also a practising doctor. Like a handful of characters in the game, I'd made a point of referring to his trade whenever he scored - he was a man of medical science, after all - and given his quick thinking in front of goal, I found I was mentioning him quite a lot. It was apparent by the reaction of these lads that, purely by accident, I had created a cult hero.
But The Good Doctor wasn't the only one. Over the years I have name-checked the previously anonymous Adam Stansfield (‘Sister Lisa will be pleased’) of Exeter City, and Arbroath's Kevin Web-ster (‘Sally will be pleased’), not to mention Hartlepool wonderkid, James ‘I Feel Good’ Brown, who gets a mention - and a song -whenever he hits the back of the net. For those of you currently scratching your heads at these ‘gags’, you will be pleased to know that you're about to receive a thorough explanation of each one over the next few pages.
Anyway, I have to admit that in writing this book I've been forced to think of the impact of my jokes as ‘the incomparable ringmaster of Sky's six-hour slog, Soccer Saturday’ (the Independent) and ‘Ranting Jeff’ (the Northern Echo). Unlike broadcasting doyens such as Kenneth ‘They think it's all over …’ Wolstenholme and Les ‘If it's up there I'll give you the money myself’ Dennis, I don't have one single catchphrase to hinge my public image on, which is probably a blessing because on the rare occasions I am asked to sign autographs I can stick to a simple, ‘All the best, Jeff.’
Instead, I've amassed an armoury of silly quips, throwaway gags and ill-advised rants. Some of them have gathered a small amount of cult interest over the years. They also tend to appear on YouTube quite a lot. Maybe it's about time I explained the methods behind the apparent madness …
‘Lisa will be pleased,
Adam Stansfield has scored!’
This was one of the first catchphrases that I ever delivered on the show. Adam Stansfield was playing at Yeovil Town, though he later moved on to the mighty Exeter City. I said it as an aside one afternoon, the link being a reference to 90s pop sensation Lisa Stansfield. Well, we'll use the term ‘sensation’ in the same way that the press refer to Robert Earnshaw as a ‘goalscoring sensation’, that is, a bit hit-and-miss. Of course, they're not really related, but for quite a while people were approaching Adam and asking about the wellbeing of Lisa. Funnier still, the catchphrase threatened to get out of hand. A local newspaper even ran a story revealing how the pair were not really siblings, such was the interest surrounding the Soccer Saturday reference.
Since then, there are a number of variations on the gag: Kevin Webster of Arbroath fame is linked to Sally because of the fictional couple in Corrie; Fulham keeper Tony Warner was linked to his non-existent brothers, after the movie company Warner Bros (do keep up at the back), and Kevin Nolan of Bolton is referred to in the same breath as The Nolan Sisters whenever he scores (‘Kevin Nolan has scored for Bolton, his sisters will be dancing’). I once received a very nice message from Kevin explaining that he doesn't actually have any sisters. He then went on to point out that he does have a lot of brothers, though they're not as easy on the eye as the girl group, I'd imagine. In hindsight, I guess this revelation could have been considered as something of a threat.
‘The Good Doctor’
While flicking through one of the many mountains of local papers I have to absorb every week (by way of research rather than any onset of OCD) I began reading about Kenny Deuchar, a prolific striker for Gretna. According to one report, he was a qualified doctor and still practised in his local hospital from time to time. This was remarkable by any footballer's standards. Can you imagine Cristiano Ronaldo even applying a Band-Aid to a stricken Page Three model, let alone practising lifesaving techniques at his local A&E? Given his worthy day job, I figured Deuchar was somebody who deserved some recognition, so I began referring to him as ‘The Good Doctor’ whenever he scored, which, to his credit, was quite a lot. I even got a very nice letter from him one day thanking