Two weeks ago, I was interviewed by the BBC World Service as our European tour was coming to an end. Christian and I were in Malaga. The interview took place at Phil and Alice’s, surrounded wet laundry in their computer room. It was a cold rainy day in Malaga.
In Auckland, New Zealand, it was a warm, end-of-summer morning. My dad, big Jimmy from Glasgow, was lying in bed, headset on listening to the BBC World Service, drifting in and out of sleep following the live roundup of football action from across the UK. It’s been the same procedure for him for as long as anyone can remember. But that morning at 4am, there I am on the radio talking in his ear and Jimmy, with no forewarning of my appearance, was suddenly awake.
A week earlier in Dakar, I couldn’t help but think of him as we sat in Mbacke’s flat in central Dakar. We were sitting with the family in a circle in the living room, eating from a communal plate containing a fantastic traditional meal of Senegalese rice and fish, when suddenly there was a cry of “goal” from the commentators on the TV. I excused myself, jumped to my feet and raced into the TV room. Rangers had scored in the 93rd minute at Ibrox. 1-0 against Celtic. I raised my fists and cheered and thought of my dad, at home in Auckland, who was certainly watching the game as happy as Rab C Nesbitt at Italia ’90.
Back in Bamako, the phone rings — it’s Matt Davies calling from the BBC. I’m slightly nervous at the thought of millions of people listening to our live conversation. But this time, I know my dad will be listening live in New Zealand.
Here are a couple of the embeddable videos that we’ve found of Dan’s world record breaking keepie-uppie marathon, which he completed on Tuesday 26th January 2010. If you know of any more, please let us know and we’ll show them here.
Sky Sports News (filmed at the kickoff in Battersea Park)
ITN News
Andrew and Christian accompanied The Ball 2010 as it was invited to appear live on the Hawksbee and Jacobs show on talkSPORT yesterday. Listen to The Ball’s appearance below:
Appearing on live radio is nerve-wracking, so many thanks to Carly Warren, Paul Hawksbee and Andy Jacobs for making us and The Ball so welcome and putting us at ease — as much as they could, at least.
If you don’t have Flash, or if the player is giving you trouble, you can download the MP3 file instead.
