Andrew Flintoff
How we’re revving up Top Gear
Is Andrew “Freddie” Flintoff the touchy-feely face of a new Top Gear? That was the impression created recently as it was announced that the returning BBC franchise would feature “hugs and nice bits”. This set alarms blaring among some fans of the series. Top Gear is still, in many ways, perceived as having been created in the image of Jeremy Clarkson. If it isn’t a bit swaggering and boorish, with jeans hitched too high and beer belly showing, what’s even the point?
“I used to watch the old Top Gear and enjoyed it,” nods the former England cricket captain, 41, who, along with comedian Paddy Mcguinness, takes over from Friends star Matt Leblanc as host (motoring journalist Chris Harris returns as Reliant Robin-style third wheel).
Flintoff insists Top Gear hasn’t gone all scented candles and manhugs. There will still be jokes and, to use the official term, “banter”.
“But humour in the world has changed. Don’t get me wrong – there’s humour in the show now. I’m all for having a laugh and a joke – but not nasty. There’s a fine line with that and I don’t think it’s one we ever come close to crossing. We’re there having a laugh. But also rooting for each other.”
Having seen episode one, I can report that the new Top Gear is essentially the same as the old Top Gear, minus the terrible denim and Jeremy Clarkson banging on about cyclists. It’s certainly an improvement on the most recent incarnation when Leblanc and Harris (and the underutilised and now jettisoned Rory Reid) trotted the globe with mixed results. Though Leblanc grew into the gig, initially he was stiffer than the gearbox on a second-hand Cortina.
Flintoff and Mcguinness, by contrast, roar off the starter grid. Five minutes in they’re hurtling across Ethiopia in a van, poking fun at Harris’s claims that his first car doubled as a mobile love nest (“don’t pretend you had girls in the car,” they hoot). It feels completely off the cuff
– a spirited return to that old TG boisterousness.
Flintoff was one of modern cricket’s greatest all-rounders. But the skill he learnt playing for England and Lancashire that is most applicable to his new job is, he feels, the ability to keep calm while all around are biting their nails.
The pressure, after all, is immense as he and Mcguinness count down to their Top Gear debuts on Sunday. Well remunerated it might be – Mcguinness and Flintoff are rumoured to be earning £500,000 per series – but the job has chewed up and spat out more than one presenter. And, thanks to its popularity around the globe, the series is one of the BBC’S key brands, making millions of pounds in merchandise and sales for the corporation’s commercial arm, BBC Studios.
When Chris Evans took over from Clarkson in 2016, the backlash was brutal. Within minutes of the credits rolling, it was clear from social media that he was a dead host walking. Viewers found his manic energy off-putting and his interactions with the rest of the team stilted.
Will Flintoff be keeping an eye on Twitter on Sunday night to gauge the public response? He shrugs, adding that he might not even watch the episode.
“I don’t know,” he says. “I’m going to visit my Dad. India and Pakistan are playing in Manchester in the World Cup, so I’ll watch that. I’ve never been one to watch myself play cricket – never mind watch myself on television.”
Flintoff was just 31 when injury forced him to retire. He initially found it difficult to cope away from the game. Since childhood, cricket had been his whole world.
“I still felt I had three or four years in me,” he says. “I’d been around cricket all my life. But I knew I didn’t want to be a coach or do commentary.”
Affable, with a lightly worn charisma, he was a natural on the airwaves. In 2010, less than a year after hanging up his whites, he joined James Corden and footballer Jamie Redknapp on the knockabout Sky panel series A League of Their Own. The show became a cult success and he hasn’t looked back.
He has presented documentaries, game shows, a celebrity singing competition (ITV’S All Star Musicals) and a talk show on Radio 5 Live.
Married, with a 14-year-old daughter and sons aged 13 and 11, he first learnt about the Top Gear opportunity after filming A League of Their Own.
“My agent came up and said, ‘Do you want to try out for Top Gear?’ It’s something we’d chatted about in the past. If there was one job on TV I’d always wanted a go at, it was Top Gear.”
Flintoff went to Top Gear’s Dunsfold Aerodrome headquarters, in Surrey, for a screen test. This boiled down to some top-level messing about on the track. He was asked to “review” a Dacia Duster and to spend time with Harris so that the producers could gauge their chemistry. At that stage, he had no idea that Mcguinness, with whom he is vaguely friendly, was coming on board as well.
“I love the show. When I went home [after the screen test] I was desperate to get it. They left me hanging a bit, to be honest. But when I got it, I couldn’t believe it. I have no idea why they picked me. I try not to think about it. In a way it still doesn’t feel real. When it goes out on Sunday – that’s when I think it will finally sink in.”
He was a fan of the Clarkson-era Top Gear, but he clearly isn’t in awe of the ghosts of TG past. He’s never met any of the previous presenters and hasn’t sought their advice. One thing he does share with Clarkson and company, however, is a passion for cars. He’s the previous owner of a Ford Mustang and of a Ferrari 612 Scaglietti, and today drives a Lamborghini Veneno and Range Rover Discovery. “I prefer cars that are a couple of years old,” he says. “I’m not big on technology or things like that.”
Top Gear is, in many ways, as much about the globe-trotting as the motoring and this season we will see Flintoff and the gang mucking about in often rudimentary environments.
How authentic is the slumming? There is a long-standing suspicion that once the cameras stop, the Top Gear team is immediately whisked away to the nearest five-star hotel.
“You go to a place like Ethiopia and you stay where you can,” he says. “The accommodation was a mixed bag. We had some nice lodges. But we also stayed in some not so nice places. You’ve got to immerse yourself. I don’t want to stay in the Four Seasons.”
Flintoff is naturally easy-going and genuinely does not seem anxious as to how his Top Gear debut is received (he and Mcguinness have signed up for two series, though he’d love to do more). When he does experience the occasional butterfly, he reminds himself that, as an international sportsman, he’s been here before.
“Try being a cricketer,” he says. “If you put your head above the parapet, people are going to have something to say about it. Obviously there’s going to be some negativity with Top Gear. There always is. Let’s see what happens.”
‘I’m all for having a joke, but there is a line we won’t cross’
Is he nervous? ‘If you put your head above the parapet, people are always going to say something’