"The end of an era": Gary Lineker says goodbye to 'Match of the Day'

LondonGary Lineker's (Leicester, 1960) successful BBC presenter career ended this Sunday night, after 26 years as host of the program. Match of the day -summary of Premier League matches-, and almost thirty linked to the public channel. "It wasn't meant to be this way," he began, referring to the circumstances of the sudden end, prompted by his social media comments about the Gaza war, just before moving on to his usual recap of the day, accompanied by Alan Shearer and Micah Richards.

At the end of the program, with a montage lasting over eleven minutes, the curtain fell on a career as brilliant on the pitch as it was in front of the cameras. Viewers were able to see a quarter of a century of Lineker, from his first day, breaking the fourth wall, to the tributes to the player, delivered in their day by Bobby Robson and Johan Cruyff. He also saw when he kept his promise to appear in his underwear (it was more like white trousers). If Leicester, his team and where he started, won the Premier.

The montage has also combined plays and goals –including with the Barça shirt, with the voice of Joaquim Maria Puyal perceptible in the background–, and special farewells, from Paul Gascoigne to Andrea Bocelli –who sang the Leicester anthem in the League celebration–, Claudio Ranieri and Pep Guardiola –"You won't believe this, but he will be missed", he told him–, and moments lived behind the lived ones.

And already in the final minute and a bit of the program, a confession: "Like in my football career, everyone did the hard work and I was left with the applause. It has been a real delight." Tears held back and a symbolic Golden Boot presented to him by Shearer and Richards, the fifth of his life, which adds to his four years as a player. All of this, "the end of an era," in Lineker's own words, said during one of his first programs a quarter of a century ago, which have been heard again and have resonated with great force.

Farewell before his time

His early retirement – he was due to commentate on next season's FA Cup and the World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada next year, as he has done since 2002, although without driving anymore Match of the day- has been almost more traumatic than her last performance with the England national team. That farewell then was also traumatic: she was substituted during a match against Sweden at Euro 1992, just one goal away from equaling Bobby Charlton's then-record of 49 goals. England lost.

Lineker has been forced to leave due to the increasing pressure he has been under in recent months, culminating two weeks ago after he shared an Instagram post from the Palestine Lobby group. Canadian-Palestinian lawyer Diana Buttu outlined her views on how Zionism has affected her people. However, the post included an image of a rat, historically associated with the Nazis' identification of Jews.

When social media caught on, the final hunt began. The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) posted on X: "Nothing to see here. Just Gary Lineker's Instagram account sharing an anti-Israel video that misrepresents Zionism, with a rat emoji." The next day, the conservative daily The Daily Telegraph It spread and the snowball began to snowball. By then, Lineker had already deleted the post.

The damage had already been done, as the CAA was also quick to demand of X: "Having looked the other way until now, it is clear at this point that Gary Lineker's continued association with the BBC is unsustainable. He must go."

On Wednesday, May 14, the former footballer also posted on Instagram an "unreserved apology for posting a message containing an emoji with terrible connotations." "Unfortunately, I didn't notice. If I had, I would never, ever have shared it. As soon as I found out, I immediately deleted the post and apologized," his message continued. Lineker was right. The emoji was difficult to see. And the only thing he could be accused of was instinctively shooting for goal, like the center forward he was.

He added: "Throughout my life I have stood up for minorities, humanitarian causes and against any form of racism, including, of course, anti-Semitism, which I deeply detest. For all these reasons, I believe it is best for everyone if I completely step down from my duties as a wonderful presenter." He has received criticism from within the network, also following questions in an interview on The Telegraph the new head of sport at the BBC for the changes he wanted to make in Match of the day for next season.

Before the final straw, Lineker had already experienced similar episodes. And he was accused of violating the BBC's impartiality rules, which were clarified and reformulated last year in the wake of another of his comments on social media where compared the border policy of the Tories and the government's language about immigrants compared to those of Nazi Germany. All of this cost him a suspension, which caused the co-presenters to withdraw from appearing on the show without Lineker and which for the first time in six decades Match of the day was broadcast without comment.

Another of the most notorious episodes took place very recently, when he criticized the BBC – along with 500 other people, in an open letter – for the withdrawal of the documentary Gaza: How to survive in warzone, which he described as "politically motivated censorship." The BBC has him shelved because of the narrator's links to a Hamas official.

Critical of Brexit

Lineker was also highly critical of Brexit and the Conservative government, expressing dissatisfaction with the "state of our politics", wondering if the Tories would return the money from "Russian donors" from whom they had benefited. These opinions earned him reprimands from the BBC's Executive Complaints Unit (ECU) for failing to meet editorial standards on impartiality, despite acknowledging that he was not obliged to do so like news journalists, although he did have an "additional responsibility" due to his profile.

The scope of his protests has extended to environmental issues, such as criticizing politicians who supported the dumping of wastewater into the sea. But he has also spoken out in coverage of major sporting events. During the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, he opened the BBC's first broadcast with a forceful criticism of the country's record on human rights violations and the treatment of migrant workers. In fact, he also admitted that he should have been more critical of Russia's record during the 2018 World Cup.

Lineker has been the latest collateral victim of the treatment of the Gaza conflict. Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023 and the beginning of the response of Benjamin Netanyahu's government –"disproportionate", In the very recent words of British Foreign Secretary David Lammy–, the British far-right media has equated criticism of the devastation and indiscriminate murder of Palestinian civilians and children with antisemitism. Thus, a manhunt has been launched against the former Barça striker (1986-89), who had long been in the spotlight.