Gary Lineker’s production company is scrapping its TV arm to concentrate on podcasts. The broadcaster and former footballer, who the BBC said would step down from hosting Match Of The Day (MOTD) at the end of the season, co-founded Goalhanger Podcasts in 2014 with former ITV controller Tony Pastor and former BBC executive Jack Davenport. It produces The Rest Is History, a historical podcast presented by Dominic Sandbrook and Tom Holland , and The Rest Is Politics with former Downing Street director of communications Alastair Campbell and ex-Tory MP Rory Stewart.
The spin-off company, Goalhanger Films Ltd, incorporated in 2014, is being voluntarily liquidated, according to Companies House. It has worked on the ITV documentary Kelly Holmes: Being Me, the BBC programmes Football, Prince William And Our Mental Health and Joshua V Klitschko: Return To Wembley, and Eurosport’s Insider: Patrick Mouratoglou, about the French tennis coach. In a statement, Mr Pastor, co-founder of Goalhanger said: “We effectively mothballed films and set up a bespoke company concentrating on podcasts.
“There was a period in which I ran them in tandem, but the growth of podcasts was so explosive and television is challenged, so we’ve now done some housekeeping. “We’ve gone from a production company being entirely beholden to commissioners and the budgets of broadcasters to having a degree of self-control, whereby we are self-commissioning.” Former Leicester City footballer Lineker is con.
