Chris Kamara is returning to work after his apraxia condition, a neurological disorder disrupting the transfer of thought from brain to speech, forced him to stand down with speech issues
Sport
Mike Walters Sports writer
21:21, 18 Dec 2024
Chris Kamara has put his unbelievable TV comeback partly down to pal Kate Garraway. The football pundit returns to our screens on Boxing Day, hooking up with old sidekick Jeff Stelling on Amazon Prime to deliver bulletins from Nottingham Forest’s game with Tottenham.
It’s an amazing return to work after his apraxia condition, a neurological disorder disrupting the transfer of thought from brain to speech, forced him to stand down with speech issues.
Chris, 66, has now revealed that, as he feared his career was over, Good Morning Britain host Kate got in touch to recommend revolutionary treatment in Mexico to help rekindle some of the fluency in his elocution.
“My last game for Sky was at Rotherham against Shrewsbury, and when I got back to the car I knew I had made a complete balls-up of it,” said Kammy. “When I checked my phone, on Twitter there were loads of comments with people saying, ‘He must have been drunk’ or ‘has he had a stroke?’
“I rang my therapist and said, ‘This can’t continue. I can’t go on like this.’ And he replied, ‘You can - but you need to tell everyone what’s going on.’ That’s when I resolved to ‘come out’ and it was the moment that changed everything. Suddenly people were 100% supportive and there were so many offers of help.
"Thankfully, one of them came from Kate Garraway, whose husband Derek had gone over to Monterrey in Mexico for treatment after contracting Long Covid. She said it had helped to stimulate parts of his brain so he could read again, for example, and she said, ‘Why don’t you give it a go?’
“I’ve been over to Mexico three times and it’s made such a difference.” Things are so much better now Kammy can’t wait to hit our screens over the festive period.
He said: “It might be one last hurrah for me in terms of covering football on the box, but to work with Jeff again will bring a bit of extra magic to Christmas for me. Of course I’m not 100%, but I’m 70% better than when I first disclosed my condition in public and I feel like I’ve got the old Kammy back.”
There will be no rehearsing in the bathroom mirror with a hairbrush as a make-believe microphone. He said: “The one thing about my job at Sky that I guarded more than anything was being spontaneous.
"I’ve lost that ability in a way but I’m going to try and wheel it out on Boxing Day. If I started to rehearse lines in my head, or tried to prepare some premeditated lines, then I would be guaranteed to mess it up.”
At his lowest ebb, Chris feared he might have joined the cast of ex-footballers visited by the blight of dementia from half a lifetime of heading a ball. It was a scary time before the definitive diagnosis of speech apraxia. “Doctors asked me how many concussions I had suffered as a player - there were three,” he said.
“And of course there were dark moments where it messes with your head. You’re doing these reports live to camera and I know I’m not me any more, but I’m not letting anyone or anybody know what’s going on.
“These little voices in your head are asking, ‘Could it be dementia? Could it be Alzheimers?’ Now I know the truth I can handle it. I’m working as much as I can, especially to help children with speech and language conditions, and I’ve stopped being a bloke who’s too stubborn to ask for help.
“The past of my brain that’s ben affected is the one that governs your memory speech fluency, but I can still sing and I can still do a Scottish accent - or both.”
English (US) ·