MYSTERY SUE
runner Lillian Board and England footballer Tom Finney.
Later team chiefs included Fred Trueman, Brendan Foster, Gareth Edwards, Emlyn Hughes, Bill Beaumont, Willie Carson, Ian Botham, Ally McCoist, John Parrott, Frankie Dettori, Matt Dawson and Phil Tufnell.
But there were also several guest captains including Bobby Moore, Bobby Charlton, Will Carling, Mary Peters, and Ricky Hatton.
Over the years the more than 3,000 different sports stars who have appeared have won 300 Olympic gold medals between them. But Olympic equestrian Princess Anne became the most famous when she appeared on the 200th episode in February 1987.
In a previous episode Emlyn Hughes had failed to recognise her in the Picture Board round, thinking she was the jockey John Reid.
And the Princess, who joined Emlyn’s team, milked his embarrassment to the max – threatening to clobber him with her handbag when he tried to put his arm around her.
In another hilarious moment captain Ally McCoist, a footballer for Rangers and Scotland, failed to recognise himself in a clip, and jockey
Frankie Dettori couldn’t unscramble an anagram of his own name.
Sue Barker said: “I’d been on the show as a panel member in the 1980s and then they got me on to be a Mystery Guest. There weren’t that many female sportspeople back then and because I had long blonde hair they had to camouflage me a lot.
“Once I had to dress up as a big cartoon cat and we actually went to Ealing and rented the costume from comedian Tommy Cooper. “When the reveal came on the show one person thought I was Ray Clemence, the Liverpool goalkeeper, and the other panellist thought I was Alan Minter, the boxer. “We’ve had great guests over the years and it’s been a privilege for a huge sports fan like me to meet these stellar names. Once, in the early 2000s we had world heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, New Zealand rugby superstar Jonah Lomu, Olympic sprint champion Maurice Greene and probably the most well-loved golfer ever, Seve Ballesteros, on the same panel.
“I remember watching the Princess Anne/Emlyn Hughes moment – it was just classic Emlyn... TV gold.
“The fact that he kept touching Princess Anne, and was embarrassed at not recognising her.”
Rival captain Matt Dawson, 47, who joined in 2004, also watched the show as a kid. The England rugby star remembers “lying on the carpet, head in hands, with my sister, with me and Mum on Bill’s side playing against her and Dad on Emyln Hughes’s.”
When his own rugby career took off Matt was invited to be the Mystery Guest on several occasions.
“They had me in a face pack in beauty spa, dressed as Count Dracula and done up as a glamorous woman going on a night out in a limo. They even made me shave my legs!”
But his most embarrassing moment came in a challenge with Paralympic judo star Sam Ingram after he won a silver medal at London 2012.
“He was really throwing me around on a mat and I was trying to get out of hold,” Matt recalls. “But I was squashed in such a position that when I moved I let out an enormous fart!”
Cricket legend Phil Tufnell, 53, became a team captain in 2008.
The challenges have got more daring since he started on the show, with Phil and Matt once made to go wing-walking and answer questions while strapped to a plane.
Phil said: “It’s just such a warm show. I grew up with it too so to become a captain was an honour.
“The rounds have changed a bit over the years – new ideas to keep the show fresh. But, in essence, it’s three people against three people with a couple of buzzers having a little chat about sport, having a laugh. It is a simple formula that seems to work.” ■ A Question of Sport at 50 is on BBC One on Friday, Dec 27, at 8.30pm and A Question of Sport: 50 Not Out is on BBC One on Friday, Jan 3, at 7.30pm.