'My wife said she didn't think I was going to look good bald'
Phil Tufnell – retired England Test cricketer turned television pundit and broadcaster – isn’t the sort of man you would expect to know the first thing about personal grooming. He is, after all, a quintessential man’s man: he likes a pint and a lazy afternoon lounging around the clubhouse watching his team, any team, play.
Just to cement his blokeish credentials further still, he has for the last six years captained one of the teams on BBC One’s A Question Of Sport.
This summer he has even appeared in a Saturday spin-off edition of the popular quiz to coincide with the World Cup evening matches, in which he and fellow team captain Matt Dawson leave the studio to face various physical challenges. He is also commentating on the India cricket tour.
‘We’re the host nation, and there’s no better place to be than England in the summer. It’s going to be great – sitting there watching the cricket, having a lovely time,’ he says, adding his trademark cheeky-chappy cackle.
So far, so what you’d expect, but then Tuffers, as he’s known to his friends, steers the conversation round to his grooming regime quicker than a fast bowler with extra topspin, and reveals he has had some cosmetic help with those twinkly boyish looks. And we’re not just talking a pedicure here or the fake tans he was so enamoured with when he appeared on Strictly Come Dancing in the 2009 series, but a full-on hair implant.
One day in January he took himself off to a fancy London clinic to have 900 hair grafts removed from the back of his head and implanted in his receding hairline. ‘I had a local anaesthetic; it took about six hours. I had a break for lunch and I was back at work the next day. To be honest, I’ve had worse days in the field,’ he says. ‘The first couple were a bit sore, but once the anaesthetic took effect I didn’t feel a thing. I haven’t felt any difference in weight at the back, or patching, where the hair was removed. It just grows back.
Matt Dawson (left) and Phil Tufnell, captains of A Question Of Sport, with host Sue Barker
‘You feel it,’ he says, inviting me to run my fingers through his hair and inspect the surgeon’s handiwork. ‘You won’t see a thing.’ I can indeed reveal this is so. On the other hand, Phil Tufnell didn’t exactly resemble a billiard ball before the treatment, which makes the decision to enhance what was an already respectable head of hair all the more extraordinary.
‘My dad went bald and so did my brother and I just thought it was one of those things, that’s my lot. It didn’t bother me and yet it did, but I didn’t think there was anything I could do about it.
‘Then my wife said to me, “I don’t know if you’re going to look good bald, Phil.” She’s a bit younger than me so I went with what she said and started looking into treatments.’ He says that far from getting a ribbing in the locker- room, his colleagues at A Question Of Sport ‘have been impressed by how natural it is’ and several other sportsmen have even asked for the clinic’s number. It was DHI Global for anyone who is interested.
‘I think those days of being embarrassed about making the most of yourself are over. You girls have been at it for years, but you can’t have it all your own way. I moisturise! I didn’t when I was in the fi eld but now that I’m on telly I have to make sure I look good.’
Tufnell retired from professional cricket in 2003 and immediately took part in – and won – ITV’s I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! which launched his TV career. Today he is a regular on BBC’s The One Show and has appeared as a panellist on a host of other game shows. He is a shrewd operator and knows that there are plenty of other former sporting stars snapping at his heels looking for a slice of the broadcasting pie once their playing days are over.
His haphazard everyman persona is part of his charm, but I suspect it also masks a streetwise intelligence and a canny approach to life. Born Philip Clive Roderick Tufnell in 1966, he grew up in Islington but attended fee-paying Highgate School where his sporting talent saw him made captain of the Junior School’s First XI. When he left he worked briefl y at his father’s silversmiths before embarking on a professional playing career for Middlesex and ultimately England.
‘F Tufnell Ltd was an Islington institution but my brother and I eff ectively ended it: he went into business, and I chose cricket. Me dad said to me: “Son, you’d be better standing in a fi eld playing cricket all day, it’s a lot better than hammering pots and pans for a living.”’
Tufnell never looked back and spent 11 years as a Test cricketer before beginning his media career. And although he may give the impression of being gloriously un-PC, peppering his conversation with terms like ‘the missus’ and ‘love’, he is careful not to criticise any fellow broadcasters. He insists he hasn’t seen the pictures of chef Gordon Ramsay that appeared in the press recently sporting what looks like a mid-transplant hairdo, and gives his full backing to Claudia Winkleman as the controversial choice to replace Sir Bruce Forsyth presenting Strictly.
‘Bruce did a fantastic job and I’m sure Claudia will do an equally fantastic job. I always liked appearing on her spin-off programme on BBC Two because she’s a bit zany, full of energy and it was always a laugh.’
He is equally reticent about discussing his domestic life. Twice divorced, he is married to third wife Dawn and has two daughters, Ellie, from a previous relationship, and Poppy, from his second marriage. His divorce from Poppy’s mother Lisa was messy and spawned a string of lurid headlines, including one in which Lisa claimed she was so stressed during their marriage that she developed an eating disorder.
‘I’d rather not talk about my daughters,’ is all he will say on the subject. He is, however, keen to lavish praise on the England women’s cricket team. And in a final drive to prove he is in touch with his feminine side he off ers some handy advice to anyone preparing for a summer as a cricket widow.
When he was playing, he was nicknamed ‘The Cat’ for his uncanny ability to nod off when he wasn’t on the pitch, so he is perhaps not best placed to extol the virtues of cricket as a thrill-a-minute spectator sport. ‘Dawn doesn’t like it, she says it takes too long and it’s not instant gratification. But I don’t think that’s a bad thing. My advice is, when your old chap goes along go with him ’cos cricket is a great game and you don’t even have to watch all day because it just sort of unfolds. It’s slow, it’s not like football where you have to watch every minute. You could just go along with your friends, in your finery. You stop for lunch, you stop for tea, have a chat and a slice of cake and glass of bubbly. And the bar is usually open all day,’ he chuckles.
He suggests detractors begin with the one-day internationals, or the Twenty20 short matches, which involve only one innings and are usually over in three hours. ‘It’s a bit more crash, bang, wallop, but the bar is still open.’ But what about the men who don’t even go to live matches but seem to be welded to the sofa for much of the summer watching games taking place across the world at all hours of day and night?
‘Do you really want to drag him away from the telly? What a perfect time to nip out and do exactly what you want to do. Meet your pals, spend some money and when you come back, you can show him what you’ve bought and he won’t take any notice because he’ll be looking past you to Cook’s batting…’
Just to cement his blokeish credentials further still, he has for the last six years captained one of the teams on BBC One’s A Question Of Sport.
This summer he has even appeared in a Saturday spin-off edition of the popular quiz to coincide with the World Cup evening matches, in which he and fellow team captain Matt Dawson leave the studio to face various physical challenges. He is also commentating on the India cricket tour.
‘We’re the host nation, and there’s no better place to be than England in the summer. It’s going to be great – sitting there watching the cricket, having a lovely time,’ he says, adding his trademark cheeky-chappy cackle.
So far, so what you’d expect, but then Tuffers, as he’s known to his friends, steers the conversation round to his grooming regime quicker than a fast bowler with extra topspin, and reveals he has had some cosmetic help with those twinkly boyish looks. And we’re not just talking a pedicure here or the fake tans he was so enamoured with when he appeared on Strictly Come Dancing in the 2009 series, but a full-on hair implant.
One day in January he took himself off to a fancy London clinic to have 900 hair grafts removed from the back of his head and implanted in his receding hairline. ‘I had a local anaesthetic; it took about six hours. I had a break for lunch and I was back at work the next day. To be honest, I’ve had worse days in the field,’ he says. ‘The first couple were a bit sore, but once the anaesthetic took effect I didn’t feel a thing. I haven’t felt any difference in weight at the back, or patching, where the hair was removed. It just grows back.
Matt Dawson (left) and Phil Tufnell, captains of A Question Of Sport, with host Sue Barker‘You feel it,’ he says, inviting me to run my fingers through his hair and inspect the surgeon’s handiwork. ‘You won’t see a thing.’ I can indeed reveal this is so. On the other hand, Phil Tufnell didn’t exactly resemble a billiard ball before the treatment, which makes the decision to enhance what was an already respectable head of hair all the more extraordinary.
‘My dad went bald and so did my brother and I just thought it was one of those things, that’s my lot. It didn’t bother me and yet it did, but I didn’t think there was anything I could do about it.
‘Then my wife said to me, “I don’t know if you’re going to look good bald, Phil.” She’s a bit younger than me so I went with what she said and started looking into treatments.’ He says that far from getting a ribbing in the locker- room, his colleagues at A Question Of Sport ‘have been impressed by how natural it is’ and several other sportsmen have even asked for the clinic’s number. It was DHI Global for anyone who is interested.
‘I think those days of being embarrassed about making the most of yourself are over. You girls have been at it for years, but you can’t have it all your own way. I moisturise! I didn’t when I was in the fi eld but now that I’m on telly I have to make sure I look good.’
Tufnell retired from professional cricket in 2003 and immediately took part in – and won – ITV’s I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! which launched his TV career. Today he is a regular on BBC’s The One Show and has appeared as a panellist on a host of other game shows. He is a shrewd operator and knows that there are plenty of other former sporting stars snapping at his heels looking for a slice of the broadcasting pie once their playing days are over.
His haphazard everyman persona is part of his charm, but I suspect it also masks a streetwise intelligence and a canny approach to life. Born Philip Clive Roderick Tufnell in 1966, he grew up in Islington but attended fee-paying Highgate School where his sporting talent saw him made captain of the Junior School’s First XI. When he left he worked briefl y at his father’s silversmiths before embarking on a professional playing career for Middlesex and ultimately England.
‘F Tufnell Ltd was an Islington institution but my brother and I eff ectively ended it: he went into business, and I chose cricket. Me dad said to me: “Son, you’d be better standing in a fi eld playing cricket all day, it’s a lot better than hammering pots and pans for a living.”’
Tufnell never looked back and spent 11 years as a Test cricketer before beginning his media career. And although he may give the impression of being gloriously un-PC, peppering his conversation with terms like ‘the missus’ and ‘love’, he is careful not to criticise any fellow broadcasters. He insists he hasn’t seen the pictures of chef Gordon Ramsay that appeared in the press recently sporting what looks like a mid-transplant hairdo, and gives his full backing to Claudia Winkleman as the controversial choice to replace Sir Bruce Forsyth presenting Strictly.
‘Bruce did a fantastic job and I’m sure Claudia will do an equally fantastic job. I always liked appearing on her spin-off programme on BBC Two because she’s a bit zany, full of energy and it was always a laugh.’
He is equally reticent about discussing his domestic life. Twice divorced, he is married to third wife Dawn and has two daughters, Ellie, from a previous relationship, and Poppy, from his second marriage. His divorce from Poppy’s mother Lisa was messy and spawned a string of lurid headlines, including one in which Lisa claimed she was so stressed during their marriage that she developed an eating disorder.
‘I’d rather not talk about my daughters,’ is all he will say on the subject. He is, however, keen to lavish praise on the England women’s cricket team. And in a final drive to prove he is in touch with his feminine side he off ers some handy advice to anyone preparing for a summer as a cricket widow.
When he was playing, he was nicknamed ‘The Cat’ for his uncanny ability to nod off when he wasn’t on the pitch, so he is perhaps not best placed to extol the virtues of cricket as a thrill-a-minute spectator sport. ‘Dawn doesn’t like it, she says it takes too long and it’s not instant gratification. But I don’t think that’s a bad thing. My advice is, when your old chap goes along go with him ’cos cricket is a great game and you don’t even have to watch all day because it just sort of unfolds. It’s slow, it’s not like football where you have to watch every minute. You could just go along with your friends, in your finery. You stop for lunch, you stop for tea, have a chat and a slice of cake and glass of bubbly. And the bar is usually open all day,’ he chuckles.
He suggests detractors begin with the one-day internationals, or the Twenty20 short matches, which involve only one innings and are usually over in three hours. ‘It’s a bit more crash, bang, wallop, but the bar is still open.’ But what about the men who don’t even go to live matches but seem to be welded to the sofa for much of the summer watching games taking place across the world at all hours of day and night?
‘Do you really want to drag him away from the telly? What a perfect time to nip out and do exactly what you want to do. Meet your pals, spend some money and when you come back, you can show him what you’ve bought and he won’t take any notice because he’ll be looking past you to Cook’s batting…’