Former Soccer Saturday presenter Jeff Stelling left Sky Sports at the end of the 2022/23 season and has landed another new role
Broadcasting legend Jeff Stelling has landed a new role as brand ambassador for OLBG and will have free rein to discuss topics that may have been off-limits in his previous roles. The Hartlepool-born broadcaster has been an ever-present on our TV screens and radio stations since the late 1970s and was synonymous with Sky Sports Soccer Saturday, which he hosted for over two decades.
Stelling left Sky at the end of the 2022/23 season after a breakdown in the relationship between himself and the company’s hierarchy. The 70-year-old was out of work for only a short time and currently has a show on talkSPORT.
He’s also now linked up with OLBG and will launch a new podcast to talk with sporting stars from his contacts book.
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After landing his new job, Stelling said: “I’m absolutely delighted to be joining OLBG, and am excited about how we can develop this new podcast series.
“I’ll be inviting guests, some old colleagues and others from the sporting world, to join in the fun and I’m sure there will be some cracking stories for viewers and listeners to hear.
“We’ll cover all the topics sports fans really enjoy, and as with everything over my career there is likely to be no shortage of laughs as well as seriousness.”
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Stelling made the decision to leave Sky at the end of the 2022/23 season and told The Guardian: “Even though I’d been there a long time, I felt some of my views weren’t considered at all.
“Every week I was fighting a battle. I got tired of fighting and it was making me ill. Eventually, I went to Sky’s management and said, ‘This is making me unwell. I’ve got to step away from it.’
“I’m almost ashamed to say it because my dad worked in a steelworks and would come back from his shift covered in grime and muck and absolutely exhausted.
“He would never have allowed me to say I was shattered after a TV show. But I felt it was making me ill so I had to step away.”
The former Soccer Saturday host was also left fuming when Matt Le Tissier, Charlie Nicholas and Phil Thompson were all axed from the show.
Writing in his ‘Saturday Afternoon Fever’ autobiography, Stelling wrote: “”How can it be the right time?’ I blurted out. ‘The season gets underway in a couple of weeks and you have sacked three of our team!’
“It’s like Man City selling [Kevin] De Bruyne, [Ilkay] Gundogan and [Bernardo] Silva two weeks before kick-off, their entire midfield, their engine room. And we have no one to replace them with.
“Gary (Hughes, Sky Sports’ head of football )insisted it was the right time and that they had people who could step into the biggest of broadcasting shoes and proceeded to reel off a list of people. After each name I made a quick-fire judgement. ‘No good.’ ‘Terminally dull.’ ‘Doesn’t even like football.’ ‘Oh, for f*** sake.’ That gives you the general tone.
“I was devastated, and as Gary listed the names of potential replacements, I knew I had a decision to make too about my future. Matt Roberts, the Soccer Saturday producer, rang.
“He had just been told of the bloodletting and was equally shocked. He was the man who had to rebuild the team – and quickly. Even Sir Alex [Ferguson] would have struggled.”
