Mike Tindall has revealed his father Phil has died aged 80 after a ‘brutal’ two-decade-long battle with Parkinson’s disease.
The former England rugby star, 47, who is married to Princess Anne‘s daughter Zara Tindall, 45, said his father passed away last week.
‘Unfortunately, my dad passed away last week,’ he said on his The Good, The Bad & The Rugby podcast on Wednesday.
Mike thanked Otley Rugby Club in West Yorkshire after players marked Phil’s death with a special tribute.
He said: ‘Big shout-out to Otley Rugby Club. They played Chester on the weekend, and they did a minute’s silence to my dad, who was captain in ’72, ’73’.
Mike revealed he had been sent footage of the tribute and had also read words about his father printed in the match programme.
‘That little moment, I got to watch it. Someone recorded it, sent it to me, and then they wrote a little thing in the programme as well, which I read,’ he added.
‘But thank you very much to Otley Rugby Club for it.’
Mike Tindall with his parents Phil and Linda at The Festival of British Eventing at Gatcombe Park, Gloucestershire in August 2009
Princess Anne and Phil Tindall are seen at the wedding of Zara Phillips and Mike Tindall in July 2011
Phil was a talented rugby player and had strong links to Otley, the Yorkshire town where his son Mike was born.
He made his first-team debut aged just 17 during the 1963-64 season, playing at fly-half and centre, before captaining the side in 1972-73.
Mike also shared a memory from his father’s younger years, revealing that Phil suffered a badly timed injury shortly before marrying his mother Linda.
He said: ‘He got married in ’69, broke his leg the week before, went down the aisle in a cast. I mean, it sort of all went wrong. He had to retire at 27.’
Phil had lived with Parkinson’s for more than two decades after being diagnosed in 2003 – the same year his son helped England win the Rugby World Cup.
The illness became a major cause for Mike, who has been a patron of Cure Parkinson’s since 2018 and has repeatedly raised money and awareness for research into the condition.
Only four months ago, Mike gave a bleak update on his father’s health, saying Parkinson’s had taken a devastating toll.
‘My dad is not doing great at the moment,’ he said in May. ‘Parkinson’s is brutal and there is no let-up from how it attacks the body and changes people.’
Mike and Zara Tindall are seen at the Handa Mike Tindall Celebrity Golf Classic held at the Belfry in the West Midlands
He said that after more than 23 years with the condition, Phil had been left ‘a shell of what he once was’.
Mike said at the time that seeing his father’s quality of life decline was why he was so determined to support efforts to find better treatments and ultimately a cure.
His mother Linda, a former social worker, had also taken on much of Phil’s care as his condition worsened.
Mike previously spoke about the impact Parkinson’s had on the family during a conversation with the Duchess of Gloucester in 2021.
He said the decline in his father’s health had become particularly marked around the time of his 2011 wedding to Zara, when Phil needed a wheelchair for parts of the day.
Mike explained problems caused by the condition had affected his father’s spine and discs and had made moving around increasingly difficult.
He also described Linda as a devoted carer who was reluctant to leave her husband alone as his needs increased.
Mike’s personal experience of the disease has since driven years of fundraising.
Cure Parkinson’s says he has supported the charity through events including his annual Celebrity Golf Classic as well as cycling and running challenges.
At this year’s golf event in May, which Zara attended on her birthday, Mike again spoke about why the charity’s work remained so personal to him.
Phil’s death comes after a lifetime in which rugby remained a strong bond between him and his son.
Mike has previously credited his father’s knowledge of the sport with helping him during a career which ultimately saw him lift the World Cup with England in 2003.




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