For a generation of younger football fans, Chris Kamara is known as one of the country’s most beloved broadcasters from his time during Soccer Saturday’s Golden Age, when the show redefined the experience of consuming Saturday afternoon football.
But this, in effect, is the third phase in Kamara’s career, which began as a player for Portsmouth in the 1970s and after more than 600 appearances, continued in the dugout when he was given the job at Bradford City in November 1995.
By the end of that season, Kamara was able to guide the Bantams to promotion back to the second tier via the playoffs, the high point in his two-year stint in charge of the West Yorkshire side.
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Why Chris Kamara packed in coaching
“An amazing day and what a memory to give those fans,” Kamara recalls to FourFourTwo on Bradford’s play-off victory.
But just two years after this play-off success, Kamara would find himself at a career crossroads, having endured a difficult ten-week spell at Stoke City.
Ever since his promotion with the Bantams, the former Leeds United midfielder found himself increasingly in demand as a television pundit.
“It was during that season that I was on television a lot more, for interviews, punditry and all the rest of it,” he continues. “It was something I loved doing.”
This failed stint at Stoke would then act as a catalyst for his future media career.
“I later went to manage Stoke and I regret that,” he admits. “I’d been popular there as a player, but it didn’t work out as a manager.”
Kamara’s ease in front of the TV cameras and his infectious personality had seen him make a considerable impact on television, with next move coming after a conversation at home.
“Once I left in 1998, I had lots of offers to return to the game,” he continues.
“But my wife Anne said, ‘You’re loving the TV work and you’re good at it, why don’t you keep going?’”
This would prove to be sage advice, changing the course of Kamara’s career and handing the viewing public one of their most beloved characters.
