GABBY Logan used an old turn of phrase to promise that Match of the Day will NOT radically change from next season.
Logan, 51, will team up with Mark Chapman and Kelly Cates to host the BBC‘s flagship football show, with Lineker stepping down from the role after 26 years in the hotseat.
AlamyGabby Logan has vowed fans that Match of the Day ‘won’t be totally different’ in the future[/caption]
PAKelly Cates (left), Mark Chapman (centre) and Logan have teamed up to host the BBC’s flagship football show from the start of next season, with Gary Lineker stepping down after 26 years[/caption]
Gary Lineker will step down from the BBC flagship show in May
Cates, Chapman, and Logan are set to split presenting duties for Match of the Day and the Sunday show between the three of them.
Lineker’s quitting statement said the Beeb planned to make changes when its new contract for the rights to Premier League football began in August.
But, despite the end of an era, Logan has vowed that the content of the show will stay the same.
Logan told the ainslie + ainslie Performance People podcast: “We’ve all presented the show before as stand ins.
“But it will feel very exciting at the start of next season. It won’t be totally different.
“Nobody wants to throw the baby out with the bath water. It’s a football highlights show, we’ve got the same kind of pundit.
“And it’s all about the football.”
The idiom is a warning against accidentally throwing away something good when discarding something else.
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Logan also revealed the lengths to which she and her co-hosts went to keep the news a secret ahead of January’s official announcement.
The former Sky Sports presenter was forced to keep it from her closest pals and family, only husband Kenny being told.
She explained: “I didn’t even tell my mum. I set up a group chat and called it ‘The Match of the Day three’.
“And there were disappearing messages as Chappers [Chapman] was really paranoid about this. The only person I told was Kenny!”
Logan was not the only one to keep her new position secret.
New colleague Cates also kept it to herself, with even Dad Kenny Dalglish kept in the dark.
They will become the show’s first permanent female presenters.
Logan said broadcasting was a “completely different landscape” for women working in sport, both in front of and behind the camera, since she started her career.
She added: “There are now so many great male and female broadcasters.
“But also, so many more females working in sports, not just in front of the camera or the microphone, but also behind the scenes.”
The BBC have confirmed that Alan Shearer and Micah Richards will continue as pundits of Match of the Day next season.
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