FourFourTwo have asked Alan Shearer and Gary Lineker for their best moments together as colleagues on the BBC.
The pair are best remembered by football fans of a certain age as the most deadly England strikers of their respective decades: Lineker the 80s and Shearer the 90s, with 78 Three Lions strikes between them. But now, the duo are united on the BBC's Match of the Day, with former Leicester City and Barcelona hero Lineker presenting, while ex-Newcastle and Blackburn forward Shearer the Beeb's premier pundit.
"We’ve been very spoiled, haven’t we? We spent a month in Rio, a month in Cape Town, Vienna, Berlin, Moscow, Qatar," Shearer responds when FFT asks for his best trip with the MOTD crew.
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"The trips are wonderful, especially when the tournament starts to break up into the quarter-finals, because then you get gaps and the fun nights out," Lineker adds. "It’s not the same as being a player, although it is in terms of the amount of time you’re away, so you need to try to have some fun."
Surely though, there must have been a fight – at least a disagreement – behind the scenes? When you spend that long with another person, after all…
"No, we’re pals," Lineker confirms. "I wouldn’t have asked him on to the podcast if I don’t get on with him!" They both laugh. In terms of a favourite match, however, they're both in agreement.
"It has to be last year’s World Cup final," Shearer says.
"That was unbelievable," Lineker agrees, "the extra time of that was the most exhilarating, nuts 30 minutes of football I’ve ever seen.
"The World Cups are special. It’s always better when the host nation does well, and England of course. In 2018, that made the tournament – it was fun being in Moscow. It wouldn’t be now, I’d imagine, but it was then and there were some really brilliant games in that tournament. England went so close, though obviously it ended up as it always bloody does, in heartache."
"We had a good night in Russia, in the bar, didn’t we?" Shearer recalls, "After an England victory, believe it or not. That was one of our nights when we were able to…"
"I think someone videoed it and it went viral," says Lineker. "You singing!"
"The breadsticks [as a microphone]!" Shearer confirms. "That was an incredible night."
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