Sky Sports legend Jeff Stelling says Matt Le Tissier was turning into ‘new David Icke’

Jeff Stelling has compared telly pal Matt Le Tissier to barmy conspiracy theorist David Icke. Former BBC host Icke has made a raft of bonkers claims for years including that there is an inter-dimensional race of reptilian beings which have hijacked the Earth.

And Jeff reckons former Southampton ace Le Tiss spouting controversial opinions online – including comparing the pandemic to the holocaust – might have cost him his job on Soccer Saturday. The presenter also said the cull at Sky Sports that saw pundits including Phil Thompson and Charlie Nicholas axed was “like a scene from Platoon”.

Jeff, 69, admitted he feared something was up when Phil phoned him and said he and Charlie were facing a meeting with a top boss. He revealed: “Moments after I put the phone down to Thommo, I knew what the fate of my mates was going to be.

“My mobile buzzed again. It was Matt Le Tissier. ‘Hi mate, how are you?’ I asked. ’Well, I was ok until five minutes ago when Sky f***ing sacked me,’ he said.

“Now Tiss had been extremely controversial on social media, particularly, but not exclusively, over Covid and there had been times on the show when I felt I was sitting next to the new David Icke. But I don’t have to share his views to get on well with him.”

Jeff said that he worried that the whole panel was going to be fired – including himself – if Le Tiss was getting the chop. He continued: “He was a little more contemporary than Thommo and Charlie. If he was getting the bullet, so were they.

“I rang Thommo back and let him know the news. All we could do was to wait for the inevitable. By 12 both had texted me one-word messages. ‘Sacked.’

“This felt like an out-of-body experience. How could they be dismantling a team that had been standard bearers at Sky for so long?

“How could they do it without even talking to me about it? At around 12.15 my mobile buzzed again.

“It was Gary Hughes, the head of football. Suddenly it dawned on me that this could be the call telling me I was finished too. I had been too worried about the boys’ fate and had not considered mine. But I was safe and so was Paul Merson.”

Others out the exit door included reporter Geoff Shreeves, commentator Martin Tyler and ex-Liverpool player and pundit Graeme Souness. Jeff added: “Thereafter it was, as Merse would say, like a scene from Platoon as big name after big name fell on the broadcasting battlefield.

David Icke had stunned reporters at a press conference in 1991 by announcing he was a “son of the Godhead” and claiming the world was going to end in 1997. In an infamous follow-up TV interview with Terry Wogan he doubled down and maintained: “The Earth will cease to exist.”

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