In today’s interview on BBC 5 live Victoria Derbyshire backed TSF in to a corner and managed to get him to reveal that he has been telling us some porkies…
The Secret Footballer told us in our interview with him that 95% of his stories told happened to him, the other 5% happening to other players, at other clubs. He then said that with these 5% he always clearly points this out by starting, ‘a friend of mine…’
He re-iterated this very fact at the beginning of today’s interview with Victoria on BBC Radio 5 Live. However, further in she managed to get it out of him that he hadn’t played actually professional football abroad, despite saying in one of his articles that he had. He then back tracked and admitted that this was referring to a fellow footballer.
What of course this means is that many of the clues we have could be rubbish! Although they may be true in ‘fact’ we now know that we shouldn’t necessarily read The Secret Footballer’s stories as actually true to him.
What do we make of this? Does this make TSF more likely to be someone in particular or does it throw the guessing game wide open and bring back in candidates that we’ve ruled out?
Right click this link and ‘save target as’ or ‘save link as’ to download TSF’s interview with Victoria Derbyshire today.
35 responses to “Victoria Derbyshire backs TSF in to a corner”
Obviously isn’t a professional footballer, this is clear to me now. I think when the time comes, they will pin it on a chosen player and pay him a fee. I now feel so sure that this isn’t a true footballer.
I agree with AK. I’ve thought for some time that there isn’t one single source for this.
er.. I’ve just read this book over the last 4 days and at no point does he claim to have played abroad. Don’t know where you got that from.
Im not too sure you know. I work in radio and have done for a number of years and if an actor would be brought in to do this it wouldnt sound like this. You would transcribe the interview, so the questions and answers… but the actor would throw in a few errms, stutters, speed tone up, low tone down, add emphasis in parts – but not all as much as you hear in this interview. If you listen carefully this person is talking very freely, the interview is very loose and semi structure (no set questions).
After listening to this on a few occasions it sounds like to me that it is real and someone somewhere let it go out either ‘live’ or ‘as live’ and forgot to put an affect over the voice. This might have been a mistake done by TSF himself as victoria says at the start, he wasnt happy with his own equipment… more like it didnt work – so we got an actor in… More like the interview went out normally and they needed to give an excuse. This is all a bit silly because the distortion would have been done after, not during…
Not putting distorts on happens all the time in Radio and in tv. They focus more on distorting voices on TV because you can see the person and they are therefore identifiable. In radio because its just the voice some producer somewhere will i think have made a genuine mistake.
You can also tell that this interview isnt done over skype. My reasoning for this is because a) it doesnt sound like skype… listen to the interview very careful, there is no drop in sound quality whatsoever. This means he was either there or n another BBC studio somewhere in the country. Even skype on the fastest broadband will still not sound as clear as radio i.e. victorias voice. And b) listen to this interview – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KGI-sXeZLA – listen how many times Date Kitson stutters, uses Ermm, listen to the speed, tone, flow of his voice and tell me thats not the same person.
Sorry to say but the BBC has blown his cover….
i’d also say that the orange football top hiding his face on the front cover of his book is in reference to his hair… kitson nailed on!
There’s more than just the book. he has a weekly column and one of his columns was all about that – http://www.thesecretfootballer.com/articles/1473/playing-abroad-welcome-to-the-new-culture-club/
Those were my thoughts when I first listened to it.
Then Victoria Derbyshire comes out and says it was a voice actor and everyone just believed her 1st time.. In my opinion she would obviously try to cover up if they’d messed it up.
As you say, the way he stumbles through his answers sounds like he is genuinely thinking about the answers. It definitely does not sound like a voice actor reading a transcript.
So glad somebody with some radio knowledge is on my team!
It’s Kitson!
My thoughts? It is Mr Kitson as labelled however I think this in itself is a red herring. That Kitson is the ‘actor’ hiding the true ‘TSF’ identity.
Diversion and rather cunning.
Personally I think it was Kitson talking, but I don’t think this was an accident. I think in actuality Kitson (representing as the actor) is the red herring and in fact he is simply a decoy.
A diversion, and a cunning one at that.
I’ve just listened to it. I’m pretty sure that it is a voice actor. A very good one mind you.
have just finished that book myself and it is cracking, whoever the TSF is he has a lot of inside knowledge regarding Leeds UTD eg Gary Kelly and Seth Johnson stories also talks about Man City old ground being redeveloped and that he had missed the boat re the luxury flats that were being bought and rented out.
Use of language is also a give away when he describes John Terry as a shit house ( scouse expression )he feels guilty re his partner being moved away from family and friends and her career suffering as a result. some people are suggesting that the TSF is a journalist who has written a book based on several interviews with different professionals. if that is the case then my friend you are a genius because the emotional content of this book is very powerful indeed.
I always thought it was Huckerby, but maybe Fowler?
It is Dean Ashton. I know it for a fact.
Dean did not play in south korea 2007 and he retired from football 3 years ago.People need to read the book.
Also cannot be ashton as he came through the crewe academy whilst ‘kitson’ did not take the usual route and got signed up late via Cambridge.
Secret footballer story has a certain fascination. It is not Wayne Rooney, Andy Graver or Jock Dodds But what about the gifted one Le Saux
A pity Shesspeare is dead. Victoria could do him
A good puzzle It could not possibly be a female footballer
Could it be the Knighted bloke who played for West Ham
What do we make of this? Well maybe could make out of it that you should just read his columns and realise its impossible to work out who it is exactly? Furthermore perhaps you should respect his desire to anonymously?
Indeed, you obviously weren’t curious
Grahame Le Saux wrote very good book. Chelsea and England. Worth a read even if hes not TSF
FRANK LAMPARD HAD PRIVATE EDUCATION COULD IT BE HIM?
My father, a journalist, says all the national papers know the name but they are just playing along. They will if the book sells
I believe the current plying thing is a smokescreen.
listen to the interview with lawson and the WAY that he speaks…
surely it is Danny Mills
like martin maxwell says below extensive knowledge of leeds and man city
i agree with the jist of what your saying. it is my opinion that it was not re recorded by an actor but does has an effect on it (to not make it identical to the person).
if it has not been rerecorded by an actor than the way he speaks (articulate, pronounces t’s etc) points to danny mills surely.
this is him speaking
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmeywn91SLU
this would mean that the current playing things is a red herring of course but would answer why he didnt disclose his current wage
It is David James, I am telling you.
It’s not any of the players suggested above – it’s an actor!
Offtopic:
Anyone here who ever thought about the book cover?
– On the UK-cover, he has a red shirt on, could he have played for a club with a red shirt?
– On the Danish-cover, he has a t-shirt with the number “10” on his chest. Could it be a sign, that he always just to play in number 10?
So who do you think it is then? Your conclusion is a bit mixed
Have you all ruled out the possibility of it being the stories and opinions of two or more players, who are all represented by the same agent or PR company?
TSF’s column this week reveals that he played under Ferguson at Man U, then played AGAINST Man U 6 years l later in a relegation battle.
Paul Ince?
No it doesn’t say that. It refers to someone else, a friend of his, who played for fergie and against him.
A friend of mine is a member of the Blackburn youth squad and has played in the reserves and trained with a number of first team players. He describes in the book on growing up in the team, the black lads took him in and he became close friends with them, my friend told me of how Danny Murphy goes on how much he loves the black players in the Blackburn squad and that he grew up with them, it sounds right the lifestyle and that he started his career at Crewe
in the book, who is the wife who gives his mate a “few strokes by the pool”….anybody know?
On the subject of being best mates with the black players at the club he talks about having his head shaved one day… does anyone know of one of the main candidates suddenly going bold?