NLP says... Be warned Jamie! It’s not easy...

Now firstly, don’t be confused, this is not a gossip column for a women’s glossy, but to give it the context it requires I need to start with a semi rant, so here goes: I despise Celebrity Big

Brother. It’s the absolute armpit of reality television. You see them every year, these grotesque ‘celebs’ wrapped up in their own self-importance. Glamour girls and their kiss-and-tell tales, coated in inches of plastic surgery, and washed-up one-hit wonders that were always better known for falling out of a nightclub in front of the waiting paparazzi than they were for their musical prowess. It’s television made for the gutter!

And yet there is always a temptation to flick it on, if only to see the cast of imbeciles it has to offer with every series. So back in January, dipping my toes into the dark and gloomy world of Channel 5, I was surprised to see Jamie O’Hara – the former Tottenham, Fulham and Wolves midfielder – having a full-scale ruck with a pensioner who has apparently stolen a celebrity living for being a cleaning lady (google Kim Woodburn; be warned you might have nightmares).

I always liked O’Hara as a footballer. The show-pony lifestyle, not to mention a failed marriage to one of those glamour girls already mentioned above, makes him a good fit for such car crash TV. But unlike his fellow housemates before and after, O’Hara has talent. In his earliest days with Tottenham, he stood out with real promise. But with every season his lavish choice of living created more talking points than his football.

An appearance on reality television is often seen as an opportunity for someone to put themselves back in the shop window to revitalise their career. In O’Hara’s case, it has worked… to an extent. Now back in the playing mix at big-spending Billericay (see page 24), with the Essex side scratching away at the play-offs door, he has the chance to rekindle his playing passion and at 30, if things tick along nice and smoothly, there may even be time for him to taste success and get back into the Football League.

But it won’t be easy, he knows that. The list of players with top-flight pedigree who have made a splash in the lower leagues is a small one. O’Hara isn’t the only marquee signing to join Ricay following the arrival of Paul Konchesky three weeks ago, but it isn’t really the blueprint for success and bigger names have struggled adapting to life in Non-League. This may be a slightly warped view, but I don’t see these guys having the same passion and hunger. Once that starts to dip, even just a fraction, a player will be found out.

We wish O’Hara well. There is a lot more to him than the public persona we see. A decent bloke who refused to take money off Gillingham earlier in the season because an ongoing foot injury kept him on the sidelines, he is a footballer who needs to be playing and is too young to be on the scrapheap. I just hope he stays in the game and doesn’t return to that awful reality show. For his sake and everyone else’s.