Sort Your Head Out: Sam Delaney on West Ham, Westminster and Everything In Between | Season 2: Episode 9 (Part 2)

This week Andrew and Max sit down with a man who's done a bit of everything - journalist, author, broadcaster and podcasting powerhouse Sam Delaney.

Before any of that, Sam was a parliamentary researcher working alongside Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband, until a switch into journalism took him through Loaded, Heat magazine (as editor-in-chief), Comedy Central UK, talkSPORT, BBC London and his own show on RT. He's written five books spanning advertising history, fatherhood and men's mental health.

On the podcasting side, Sam co-hosts the hugely popular Top Flight Time Machine (25 million-plus downloads and counting), runs The Reset (a deep dive into men's mental health) and, keeping things claret and blue, co-hosts You Irons alongside The Athletic's Roshane Thomas and George Pointon.

In this episode, we cover the lot: his path from Westminster to the media, the highs (and stress) of running Heat and Comedy Central, fatherhood and Night of the Living Dad, the state of men's mental health today, and of course his own West Ham story. We finish with the quickfire questions — first game, best goal, worst heartbreak and what "the West Ham way" really means to him.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You're listening to the West Ham Syndrome Podcast, the show where we look at West Ham United beyond the match day, with your hosts Andrew Jenkin and Max Portman.

SPEAKER_02 0:12

Hello, and you're listening to the West Ham Syndrome Podcast, where we look at West Ham United beyond the match day. So for our listeners who have been tuning in now for the last few weeks, you know that last week we had a really great part one of our interview with Sam Delaney, which went on for two hours, and we can't thank Sam enough for giving us so much time and for being such an amazing guest. So without further ado, here's part two of the interview.

SPEAKER_03 0:38

I'd love to ask you about after your time with with heat and you and you went to work in radio for a bit, but then going to work for Comedy Central, what was that like as an experience and how do you kind of see how do you look back on that that time of your of your life?

SPEAKER_01 0:52

Well, I hated the company I was working for because it was like it was at MTV Studios because the cut same company owned MTV and Nickelodeon. It was all in one building. And I'd been to that building a lot over the years to work in the studios there or do other bits and bobs freelancer. And I thought, what a cool place in the middle of Camden Town. And you walk in and you've got the big MTV sign, and there's a huge plastic sponge bob in the reception area, and you think this is such a laugh, what a great place to work. But actually, I found it really suffocatingly corporate and tedious. And I thought, oh, this is one of those places that's pretending to be fun, but might as well just be a bank, right? Which it is not something I was interested in. Some of my memories are miserable, but I did get to assemble my own team, which was great because everyone who came and worked there was brilliant, and we had a really good laugh. And our only job every day was to come up with silly ideas, which is really what all I've ever wanted to do for a living. And uh we commissioned some massive hits. So, like I commissioned a show with KSI, I wanted to do the British version of the Comedy Roast, which had been big in America for years, but hadn't at that stage been done in the UK. They subsequently did do it on the TV version of U Comedy UK, and I think it was shit, right? But I wanted to do it, and I but I had to speak to the Comedy Central bosses in America to get the rights to use the brand, and they said you can't have it. I don't know why. I said it's ridiculous, the same company, and they said, No, no, no, we don't want Brits making it. So I thought I'll change the name and I changed it to Demolished, and I thought, who can I get? And I I thought I want to get Rio Ferdinand, he'd just retired and he had and he clearly wanted to do more in TV, and he briefly saw himself as some sort of funny guy, right? Because he had like his prank show and stuff. So I thought, great, he's got a big social media following as well. This will be perfect because it was going to be an online show. So I started speaking to his like people, and we were close to doing a deal, but but then I saw he'd launched his YouTube channel and his he'd had a guest on it, and the guest was KSI, who I, in my naivety, because KSI was still a fairly new phenomenon, hadn't heard of. So I gone to one of the young people who worked with me, who's this bloke? And why is he on Rio Ferdinand's channel? I said, Oh, he'll be there, he'll be getting paid by Rio Ferdinand to be on his channel because he will be able to boost Rio Ferdinand's profile. I said, What are you talking about? Shouldn't it be the other way around? I never heard that bloke. They said, No, no, this is YouTube, this is totally different. He's the star, Rio Ferdinand's the newcomer. So last minute I said, Well, maybe we should be getting that guy to be on our show, not Rio Ferdinand. They said, Well, yeah, but you'll never get him. But I managed to convince, I mean, my bosses there were even older than me, so they knew even less about me, and I had to really like fight for it and convince them to find extra money from here, there, and everywhere to convince KSI. At the time, you know, I mean, he was nowhere near as rich as he was now, but he was already rich enough to have like, I remember him telling me that he'd bought his mum and dad's house off with them, but then bought another house next door and made them move out so he could just stay in his own house but live in it on his own, right? And I was like, This is incredible. I think he was still a teenager. So I managed to and and him and his his agent, his his manager, were like, if you ask us to come out of the house and stop doing a video for one day, that costs us X amount, it was a huge amount. So you need to compensate us for the lost money and then pay us a fee as well. And I did, and it was worth it because we made this sort of six-episode thing, and people say about break the internet, I think it really did. I mean, it was like I was shitting myself because I thought I'll again I'll get the sack, I've spent so much money, and like no one, no one at Comedy Central, because it was such an old-fashioned company had heard of this guy, and they're all waiting for me to fail. And like it was one of those ones where on the day it launched, the the viewers were stuck on you know, when you get stuck on 401 and it was just stuck there. And again, I was pretty naive about digital media. I was like, 401 views, that's no bloody good. No, that no, no, if it gets stuck on that, that's a good thing, and then like you know, within hours we're watching the figures go up, we're all gathered around it, and like in the end, it's like 10 million overnight, right? And then it's gone up 20, 30, 40, 30, it was like phenomenal. So then I convinced the company to pile even more money and make another one with all of the sidemen. But this is in 2014, you know. This is like before the side men became as phenomenal as they are now, but they're already big. So the second one we did, which was called Unleashed or something like that, where we just got them in the studio basically chucking stuff at each other, really. And it was just it was just so massive, it was it was absolutely huge. I remember like KSI coming in for meetings. I go, Well, how can we get him into the office? No, he won't come in, he doesn't need to come anywhere. And I go, but in the end, like you do things like you get like loads of KFC, have a rider just to come for a meeting, like certain drinks and food, and he'd come in and have all the the side men sat around this office, and uh and I'm trying to explain to them what the idea for the show is, and they're sort of being polite, but KSI just falls to sleep in the meeting, and all the rest of the side men are having a go at him, going, Oh, that's just he's just being arrogant and all the rest of it. I said, Don't worry, if I was him, I'd be arrogant as well. I think this is amazing. I'm really here for people who fall asleep in meetings. I'm very aware of the stuff I'm telling you, it's really fucking boring, and all you want to do is turn up, get paid, and go home again. That's fine. But I learned a lot there about the digital world and working with them was fascinating, and then seeing them get even bigger over the years since then has has been incredible.

SPEAKER_03 6:27

Do you see you know things like the the ballers league and everything that's sort of happening? And obviously, we spoke a little bit at the start about the influence of the World Cup in the States right now. I mean, how do you see the kind of direction of football going in the UK with some of those trends that are picking up and and you know, YouTube and and it and are you kind of worried about I mean the UK we're s we're very sort of sort of traditional in many respects, and we don't want to tinker too much with stuff, but yeah, you know, there are a lot of Americanisms that could seep into the game. Are you worried about that or are you just embraced?

SPEAKER_01 6:57

Well, yeah, I hate a huge amount about modern football, football fandom, football culture, and I get more of an old grumpy bastard by the day. And my my latest thing that I've been saying to Andy on Top Flight Time Machine, my podcast, is football be a lot better if they just stop televising it completely. Everything bad has happened. I'm like, if you want to see the game, fucking go to the game. If not, shut up, find something else to do. Right. Or everything bad, var, all this shit. But you know, I'm being a bit facetious, but I am more and more switched off to all of the modern shit about football, the experience of going to the games, the crap on TV, the punditry, the nonsense on social media, the performative nonsense of football fandom. But I'm also aware that I'm 51, I'm old, you know, grumpy. This is exactly the sort of shit that older people have said to me when I was younger. So fine, let people get on with it. I mean, you know, there's nothing I can do, like an old man shouting at the moon. But obviously, I think it's a load of bollocks. I like to go to West Ham with my son, my brother, my mates, watch the game, come home, try not to think about it too much.

SPEAKER_03 8:07

Want to quickly ask you, I appreciate we've gone through a lot of your kind of um work to date, but a couple of things. So I know Max told you I recently became a dad for the first time. I know that you you'd written your book, Night of the Living Dad, in 2009, and the book you mentioned earlier, Mad Men and Bad Men in 2015. But what did you find about being a new dad for the first time? And I suppose what advice would you give to new dads, in my position?

SPEAKER_01 8:32

I would say look after yourself because what you do is you kind of fly into fatherhood, and if you're a nice guy, which clearly you are, you kind of think I want to be there for my missus and for my kid, and I'm gonna be an exceptional husband and acceptable father, and that just means devoting myself to them and their needs. And there's some truth in that, but what you have to understand is if you don't also look after yourself in various ways, you will ultimately let them down too, because you will burn out and it'll get too much. It's a huge thing, it's exhausting physically, mentally, and emotionally. And although it's true that you could say it's harder for the mums, yeah, it is, but it's not a competition. Like speaking from personal experience, I wrote that book in the first year of being a dad, and I wanted to really be I was almost competitive, I wanted to be the best dad, and I was delighted, but it was so difficult in all of those ways. Also, whilst juggling career stuff and wanting to provide, and you know, a few years later I got into real trouble with drinking drugs, real trouble, you know. I was it was and and that was because I had I'd sort of tried to be everything all at once. I wanted to still have this career that was very busy and weren't really like, you know, take every opportunity that was thrown my way. I still wanted, I didn't want to sacrifice any of the sort of business of my social life and being alive and being out my mates and going to all the West Ham games and getting trashed. But I also wanted to be up in the night. I wanted to be there for my wife and my kids. I wanted to be up in the night, I wanted to be taken to the park at weekends and all that. Something has got to give, and you're so busy thinking about other people, in the end, you can break. And I think that's why I, you know, I'd always liked a drink and to party, let's say. But in my late 30s, around that time I was working at Comedy Central, all the things that used to feel like manageable little fun things to do once in a while with your mates at weekends became really quickly escalated at a very fast rate. And you know, I had to fix myself. I had to go to AA, I had to go to like therapy, and you know, I'm 11 years sober now. But if I look back, and I'm not saying it's gonna happen to everyone, by the way, I'm not like, oh, you know, you have to give up. I'm I'm not an advocate of telling everyone to give up drinking at all. You know, in fact, quite the opposite. It's like if you drink, it's not a problem, go for your life, it's nice, what a great way to unwind. And it's not always gonna lead you to those things. But the principle is if you're too busy trying to like provide for everyone else and every person to everyone, you know, and you're not getting enough rest, you're not treating yourself kindly, you're not acknowledging the fact that sometimes shit is really tough, you're not talking to someone about that, eating properly, taking time out, you know, or the other thing is do put time in the diary to be with your mates, do go to the odd away game and have a weekend away, or go on your mate's stag once in a while to clear your head and remind yourself that you can just have a laugh sometimes. Because if not, you can burn out. And if you burn out, if you don't look after yourself, you can't look after the other people you care about. So that's a bit of a heavy answer, but it's a lot of what I've written about in my last couple of books, and it's important.

SPEAKER_02 11:31

Well, I have a question because I've got an uncle who's 26 years sober, and one of the things on the steps is that you've got to give yourself over to something bigger. Would you say your family were the thing you gave over to over that was bigger, or was it just everything? What was the thing that you found helped you?

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Yeah, I mean, there's different interpretations of that. Some people are put off by it because they think it's some idea of God, and some people aren't comfortable with that. I don't think it I think it's just an idea, and the idea is giving yourself over to the process that helps you get sober and stay sober. So it's a bit like say you go to the gym, right? I got a PT and some and you know, we've always got a target of what what I can bench, right? What am I going to be able to bench by the end of summer or by the end of the year or whatever? And some weeks it goes really well, and some weeks you feel like you're going backwards, and sometimes I want to talk to him about that, but ultimately, you know, it's that thing where you go, trust the process. If you trust this process, don't question it, just give in to it. In the end, you will get to where you want to go. And the reason we know that is it's worked for so many other people. And so, in the case of going to the gym, that has worked. I've been seeing in the whole time I'm sober, and it it works. If I just kind of keep doing the little things repeatedly that he tells me to do, in the end, I I end up hitting my target, not always at the exact right point that I wanted to, but I will hit it eventually. And so now I don't question me, I just turn up and do the shit that I need to do. And that is what for me, giving yourself some bigger means in AA is that you basically accept without kind of questioning to a degree, this is a process that has worked for a lot of other people. It's not the right way for everyone. I don't say everyone who wants to give up drinking, you have to do it AA. I'm not a zealot like that. And to be honest, I didn't, you know, I I can't remember the last time I went to an AA meeting. I've sort of done a mix and match approach to getting and staying sober. But you know, I don't think you can do it for anyone else. That the the mistake is you think I'll have a wife and kid and I love them so much that I'll give up drinking for them. But if you're in a situation where you think, I actually personally still want to have a drink, I want to go out and and do this, but I'm sacrificing that because I love my family so much, that won't work because you will resent them, you'll get full of frustration, resentment, because you're denying yourself something you want to do. If you arrive at a point where you realise that your life is better without drink, then you're not doing it for anyone else other than yourself. I don't crave a drink because I think now, oh my god, if I had a drink, it'd be awful. I couldn't I can know straight away all the different ways that that would mess with all the things that I value in my life, right? And I would just feel like shit. So I don't want to. So it's not but if I was thinking I could murder a pine, but the missus will be right in my ear roll, that would last, I mean, five minutes. Because you know, you just you can't do it for someone else, you can only do it for yourself. And like I say, you don't need to do it unless you really hate unless it's got to the stage where it's actually causing you more hurt than good, you know.

SPEAKER_02 14:28

No, I agree. Yeah, you've got to do it for the right reasons, not for the wrong reasons, yeah. And you're right, you've got to do it for yourself because everybody can force you into it, but it's not really gonna help anybody, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:37

Because you said the resentment kicks in and it just exactly. Like people go to rehab and they don't want to be there, but they've been sort of forced to by parents or loved ones. And it's like they just want to get out and get back on the piss again because it's just makes them angry and resentful. And I'm not surprised because no one wants to be forced to do anything, you know. So they call it it, some people call it the the gift of desperation, right? Which I think is a little bit of what I had. I was at a stage where I was like, I could drink and do drugs, and it wouldn't really make me feel any better, it would just usually make me feel worse, but I carry on doing it anyway, so it's a form of madness. You're doing something that you know makes you feel worse, but you keep doing it because you think maybe I'll hit a point where it'll make me feel better, it'll go full circle. But every day you wake up thinking I don't want to do that today, and then every day you end up doing it anyway, and then you always end up feeling shit about it. For me, that's the clearest way that you've got a problem that you need to take control of. If you wake up every day thinking, I am not gonna drink or two drugs, but you end up doing it anyway, even though you've promised that you don't want to do it, and then doing it always makes you end up feeling shit about yourself. That's not a good situation, but it has to tick all three of those boxes because it's fine to wake up and think I'm gonna have a day off today, I've been overdoing it, I'm not gonna drink today, and then suddenly the sun's out, you find yourself with your mates after work, and they go go and come for one, and you go, All right, and then you do have a few, but then when you wake up the next morning, you don't think, I can't believe I did that. I I hate myself and I feel like shit. What you actually think is, Oh, well, I'm playing that, but it was quite a laugh, actually. Never mind. Do you know what I mean? That's fine, that's fine, you know. We all do spontaneous things, that's nice, but I wasn't like that. I was like, Oh my god, I'm continuing in this cycle of doom where I feel like terrible. So then giving up completely becomes quite appealing. Cutting down, very difficult, really difficult, impossible for me. I'm very all or nothing. I can go, well, maybe I'll just start having one glass of wine with dinner. Fuck that. You know, it was much easier to go, right? I'm giving up forever. And that's what I did. I hope forever, anyway.

SPEAKER_02 16:40

Yeah, and that's the thing. It's that if your journey is your journey, like no one else can tell you any different. No. I mean, we've completely gone off topic here, but that's the nice part about it, podcasts, right? You can just go down many. Yeah, actually, it alerted me to you for the first time was Sam Delaney's news thing, which ran from 2015 to 2018, and you had some great moments. So don't know how you did it, and I'm gonna ask you how you did it. Ken Liversting went in with you on Easy Lover, Alexander O'Neill on criticised, which by the fantastic. The fact you did the eye bits, that's what got me.

SPEAKER_01 17:09

Oh, yeah, amazing.

SPEAKER_02 17:11

That did break the internet was little girl telling Nigel Farage he hates foreigners. So, how far how fun was it making that show? And do you have any personal highlights for making it part of the few that I have mentioned?

SPEAKER_01 17:21

Yeah, it was it was the best laugh. It was the best laugh because it was an opportunity to basically it up until that point in my career, I'd done all these different things, many of which we talked about, and in every job I'd done, whether it was on radio, TV, magazines, newspapers, I'd met people along the way at every stage, at every different job, in every different industry where you have a connection with and they make you laugh and you think I'd love to work with them again. And then when I got this opportunity was to make it as an independent production for this channel, and because the channel's frankly toxic, I did it on the basis that I knew it was quite a dodgy thing to get involved in in some ways. So I thought this might reflect on me badly for being associated with a channel that is part funded by the Russian state. This is long before the war in Ukraine, but nevertheless, it wasn't there was nothing illegal about it, but I was aware it wouldn't necessarily be a good look. But I said they met they gave me the opportunity, and I said I'll do it if I can do it through my own independent company, which I'd just launched anyway, and with no editor, you know, you can get editorial sign-off for legal reasons, but no involvement. And they said okay, and as a result of that, I got to build a team of pretty much like a greatest hits of everyone I'd always I'd ever worked with. I was 40, I'd just got sober, literally a couple of months beforehand. So I suddenly had a huge amount of energy, and I had this opportunity, and it was like I went and pulled together the dirty dozen, like you know, it was like all the best people I knew and had worked with and thought were funny, and even some I hadn't met, but I was a fan of, right? And I'd just heard them or seen their writing, and I I sort of would like try and call them up and go, listen, I'm doing this thing, do you want to get involved? And some of them did, and so it was such an amazing opportunity, and we had the absolute best fun doing it, and because there was no one overseeing anything, like they just signed that off blindly every week without even watching. I think all they were worried about was legal blowback, but we were you know, we had uh the producer who made it was a guy called Ben Rigdon, and he had been the producer of the Big Breakfast in its golden age with Johnny and Denise, right? And I'd loved that show, it'd been a big influence on me in like the late 90s, early noughties. So that's another example. That was my favourite show, right, when I was younger, and so I thought I loved the chaos and the anarchy and the silliness of it. So who could who would be the best person I could get to produce my show? Him, the guy who made that. So he came in to produce it, he's very experienced, so he made sure that we didn't do anything that was going to get us legally exposed, but he also was not sort of like, I'm gonna tell you how to make this funny, I'm gonna tell you how to write it. He wanted, he encouraged us, like a football manager who's mad and says, Go out and express yourself. He would get me and the other writers on the show, one of whom was Andy Dawson, to just go, come up, make up whatever you want and do it. And the more stupid we did it, the more he would be enthusiastic and laugh. And I got into a thing where a lot of the time I was just trying to come up with ideas that would impress him. Because I quite looked up to him, he was like, you know, sort of quite a big deal producer in his time. And I was like, Oh, Ben Ben, what do you think? Would do this? And if and he he would laugh, and I'd get a kick out of that. Do you know what I mean? Like trying to make your dad laugh, I suppose, when you were a kid. That's a bit rude to him, he wasn't that much older than me. But like, yeah, I mean, those things you mentioned there, you know, there's a thing where like I'm interviewing during the Brexit referendum campaign, Kate Howie, who was a Labour MP who was pro-Brexit, and it's a serious interview, but then at the end, I can't remember, like, you know, there was always weird things coming up in the Brexit campaign about oh well, this will happen, and it was always like more and more obscure. So that week someone had said, you know, it means we're gonna have to cull a load of horses, right? Love shit like that, you know. Like, if we stay in Europe, they're gonna make us cull a load of British horses. It was something daft, but for whatever reason, at the end of my quite serious political interview with her, one of the writers, bloke called Mark Haynes, comes on dressed as a pantomime horse, right, but in a flat cap, wearing a Brexit rosette, right? And comes up because I've made a joke about horses, and he comes in, he's talking in a northern accent. He went, I heard what you said about horses, and it's disgusting, and it's typical of the London media elite to have that kind of prejudice. And I and I've gone, listen, mate, wind it in. I don't know how you got in here, but this is a serious news programme, and it's no place horses. And then suddenly we staged it, so he punched me this horse, right? And then we cut it so it looked live, and I'm standing back up, he's decked me, I'm standing back up, and then makeup have made me have a really big black eye, right? And then security have come on and are like wrestling this horse to the ground, and there's a picture. That came up on my Facebook memories the other day of me standing next to Kate Hoey, who is a deeply serious, quite boring politician, right, who is very, very pro-Brexit. And me with a fake black eye and this pantomime horse running around behind us, and she looks so confused. And I send it to the guys who used to work on the show with me and go, these were like the best type days ever, right? Because sometimes it was like it's a bit like the attitude me and Andy have to do in Top Flight Time Machine. It's like, as long as we find it funny, that's all we care about. And sometimes, if we find it funny and no one else does, we get a bigger kick out of that, which is not not a very commercial way to run any creative enterprise, but I don't know what it is, but I get a real kick out of that, you know, and it's the the spirit of it to some degree is very much in Top Flight Time Machine. And the other one, there's a picture of me, and I'm interviewing Chris Ryan, who is an old mate of mine who's an SAS legend, and I I've known him for years because I used to ghostwrite a column for him. And I got him on the show to talk to us about his new book, which was about how to deal with terrorists if you meet them in the wild, right? So if you're on a plane or somewhere in it, like a mad book, right? Like an SAS guy tells you what to do if you ever come across a fucking terrorist, right? And uh I'm asking him, and he's like, he's told me that's something with a pen that you can do. He goes, I'll I'll disable you with one pen, right? So I go okay, do it, right? And and he's like, he's somehow got me on my knees and he's put a one Biro under my nose and he's lifting it just with two fingers, and it's so painful that I am almost paralysed. But I'm there in my suit in this news studio, and for some reason we'd got we'd managed to get Mr. Blobby on the show that week as well, right? And even that is because I'd been on Sky the day before. I used to do the newspaper reviews on Sky, and I bumped into the television presenter Alice Beer, and I was doing the news review with her, and backstage before the show, just mentioned casually that her husband co-owned the rights to Mr. Blobby, right? And I've gone, that's amazing. I love Mr. Blobby. I wondered what he was up to now. She went, Oh, yeah, you can hire him and just call my husband. I said, Well, funny you say that, I've got my own TV show. Can we book him tomorrow? She went, Yeah, I'll call my husband now. So then I called the producer, I just booked Mr. Blobby. He goes, Well, I said, I don't know, but you know, just chuck Mr. Blobby into it somehow or another, it's gonna be great. And then I'm being tortured by Chris Ryan from the SAS, right, in the studio. And suddenly Mr. Blobby just fucking runs into the studio with a trolley with like cakes on it and shit, smashes it over. Ian Lee's there as one of the guests, he's sitting on the panel, and you just hear him shout, fucking hell, blobby, you twat, right? And then Mr. Blobby runs over and is trying to like get Chris Ryan off of me. And Chris Ryan's like, fuck him, he doesn't want any part of Mr. Blobby, he thinks this is undermining him, right? And there's just a picture of me on my knees in my nice suit with this pen under my thing, and I'm like in real pain, it's not acting. I'm like, ah and Chris Ryan's torturing me, and he's and then just behind him is Mr. Blobby like going crazy, and that's another one of the pictures that I occasionally just share on WhatsApp to the guys I used to work with on that show. And you don't even need to even lose the note, but I have that some I had it on social media once when I was still on Twitter just saying this one image sums up my career like messy, pointless, nonsense, nonsensical.

SPEAKER_02 25:23

Trying not to stop laughing, that's classic. That is really good. I can imagine it's just blobby in any capacity, just gets me.

SPEAKER_01 25:31

Yeah, no, yeah, me too. And everyone on the show felt the same way, like we all loved Mr. Blob. We were all different ages, right? We were different ages, we're from different parts of the country, we'd grown up in different sort of backgrounds, but everyone had this like obsession with Mr. Blob.

SPEAKER_02 25:51

I was gonna say what you were saying about things that other people won't find that we do, but this is me and Andrew. We've decided to do a whole thing now that remember Javier Margas. Oh yeah. We've done a whole thing, we've done a whole thing that he's a um John McAfee character and he's just gone on the run now and he has never gone back to Chile. So I've kind of done a whole Andrew from the sensory that he's done this whole thing, he's like, Yeah, fuck it, let's do it. And it's just basically he's on the run, and wherever he appears, he just appears. So it's just his that's brilliant.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

They're the best fun, and it's what great friendships are but are built on. Like when you've got that sort of thing that yeah, I just think they're the funniest things, and you know, stuff where like this is like when I worked at Comedy Central, one of the reasons I hated it was was that they would try to come up with ideas by numbers and focus group. It's the opposite of how you come up with good things that people love because you're asking the dopes who you're trying to appeal to what they want to see. But I think there's a quote from Noel Gallagher going, Fuck them, they don't know what they want to see until they see it. You know, they don't fucking know. Literally. I know because I'm the fucking songwriter. They didn't know if I'd gone and asked like a million Oasis fans, you know, what what they wanted from my next song, they wouldn't have come up with fucking Wonder Wall, right?

SPEAKER_00 27:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:06

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting for a moment that any of the fucking ludicrous bullshit I've been responsible for is on that level. But the principle of basically just coming up with shit that makes you laugh is quite a good starting point for any creative endeavour.

SPEAKER_03 27:21

And I think there's there's quite a lot of stuff again. Sorry, going back to the World Cup at the moment, there's quite a lot of stuff that feels like you know, organisers have thought fans like this, so they're kind of like shoehorned in, right? Whereas actually all the stuff forever has always been the organic stuff that fans have themselves come up with, right? So, yeah, there's totally that that very much sort of organic point. I'm conscious of your time, Sam. I want to ask you a little bit about podcasting. Obviously, you've got top flight five machine. I thought I saw you in Glasgow a couple of years ago, actually. Oh, nice one. But you know, just that whole worked in all these different types of media, and and how much do you get a kick out of doing podcasting? And you know, what how does it kind of I suppose take some of the shackles off from the restraints of typical broadcasting, you know, traditions?

SPEAKER_01 28:06

In many ways, Top Light Time Machine is the best thing I've ever done out of all of this stuff, and it really is a good fit for me because you know, I'm not brilliant process, I get bored easily, and you know, the opportunity to just come up with the sort of shit that I was just talking about from News Thing. The thing about News Thing is, or any of the magazines I worked on, I come up with ideas like this, or I surround myself with other funny, creative people who come up with great ideas, but then you have to go and execute them, and that's the bit where I quickly get bored of, right? And it's I fucking hell, now we've got to do it. So you come up with an idea for a TV show, then you've got to go out and film it and edit it, and it's just like time consuming, and there's too much between the idea coming out of your mouth and then the idea becoming a reality, right? And along the way, it goes from being extreme fun, so the ideas meet and you're all pissing yourselves laughing, to then along the way it gets boring and technical and blah blah blah. What I love about Top Flight Time Machine is that we just we've never scripted or planned a single episode in the eight and a half years we've been doing it. We just sit down and see what comes out of our heads and our mouths, and then it's forgotten about it to the extent that occasionally later the same day we'll get an email in response to something we've said or done on a podcast, and it like genuinely neither of us have got a fucking idea what someone's referring to, right? Because I think we've been doing it for so long that literally the stuff that just we say on a whim is so disposable it we forget. People go, oh, what about this thing you said earlier? We've forgotten immediately, and that's not like us being arrogant, like, oh, who cares? It's just that we just we do it, we're like we're just doing it non-stop. And I think it's like a lot of it's like throwing a load of mm shit at the wall. You know, we say so much bollocks that if you shift through it, like maybe one thing per show is gonna make someone laugh. But it's perfect for me for that, the spontaneity, but more than that, like to be honest, the lifestyle it's given me, you know, because we managed to monetize it, it's allowed me to, you know, work from home, speak to my mate every day for like half an hour, but because it helps pay the bills, kind of allowed me to pursue other things such as writing books and stuff that I probably would have given up on after 2015 because you know, books make you a bit of money, but they don't exactly make you rich. Some you know, I've done all right out of books, I've been lucky, but you know, they take a lot of time commitment, and you know, I'm lucky, for instance, that I've written a couple of books that have come out since Top Flight started. I'm working on more at the moment, and without Top Flight, I might not have the privilege or the time or the space or the security to do that. So, in terms of looking back on my work in life and my lifestyle and everything, this is the best era because creatively it's a really good laugh, but also in practical terms, it sort of allows me to have a nice lifestyle. I mean, I'm sitting there talking to you two, which is yeah, very pleasurable, which you know, had more responsibilities other than speaking to Andy at some point later today. Yeah, I wouldn't be able to do.

SPEAKER_03 31:02

Yeah, absolutely. Let's just quickly talk about West the West Ham podcast as well. How did that kind of start about with Roshayne and forgive me if I'm uh incorrect here, Sam, but it started off as part of the athletic and then and you sort of took your own route with it, is that right?

SPEAKER_01 31:14

Yeah, so what happened was I was worked at Tort Sport for years on air, and one of the senior two of the senior producers left TortSport in about whenever the athletic started, I think it was about 2018. They got poached by the athletic. The athletic landed in the UK and started like poaching a lot of people from all different media organisations and the newspapers and stuff. So they they took two of the senior people from TortSport and said, Head up our podcast division. And I, you know, this was a guy who produced me for years and you know, I got on with so he called up and said, Right, we're gonna launch a specific pod for not all the clubs, but all the best supported ones. We do you want to do the West Ham one? And I just went, Yeah, fine. They said we'll pay you to do it. And I thought that's good because on the other podcasts I do, you've got to build your own audience to monetize, whereas this is just like you're just gonna pay me to do it, fine. And then they introduced me to a show, they said we've got a full-time West Ham correspondent, and they introduced me to him. It turned out that I'd met him before because he'd done work experience at Talksport years previously, and he'd been on a few shows I'd done, like manning the phones, like the poor bastard who has to you know, sort of filter the the callers before putting them on air. So I'd met him briefly then, so we had a bit of history, and so yeah, we just they I think for two seasons we did it and they paid us quite well. Well, they paid me, he was this was just part of his a salaried employee. But then after two seasons, they said we're dropping most of the podcasts, other than you know, I think Liverpool, Man, New Arsenal, the three big ones. Presumably it didn't make economic sense for them to keep doing the other ones. So we'll just focus in on these big clubs. So I said, okay, and I thought, you know, easy come, easy go. But then we got a lot of people on social media coming to us and saying, Oh, we quite enjoyed that, you're gonna do it again. So I spoke to Rashane and he said we said, Yeah, let's let's try and do it. And then shortly after that, he and he met George on Twitter because George had a huge, really funny Twitter account. And George had just approached him and said, I like listening to your West Ham podcast. I'm a West Ham fan too. Have me on as a guest. And Roshane said we should get this guy on as a guest. He didn't really know him that well. We said we should get him on because he's got a huge Twitter following, right? So then we got him on, I think just the idea was a guest one week, and but we we thought he was so funny and got on with him so well that we just said I'll keep coming back all the time. And then we did it just on our own for like maybe another two years, and I don't think it was making any money at all, maybe made a tiny bit of ad revenue, but next to nothing. But you know, we were just doing it as a labour of love, and it was quite funny because Dave and X, who I'd just got to know over the years and I love their podcast, they just invited me on as a guest, a bit like what we're doing today, right? Talking about my work and blah blah blah. And then it went really well. We had a really good laugh, and then afterwards, Dave texted or called me and went, Do you know what we've been thinking? We're gonna expand, do more pods. Have you ever considered doing a West Ham podcast? I said, Have I ever considered doing a West Ham podcast? I've had one for the last bloody four years, you rude bastard. It was really sobering because I was like, theirs is the biggest, right? And I'm an avid listener of theirs and have been from day one, even when they were on Phoenix FM before I even knew them. But it was so sobering when I thought about uh it was almost like it's your big break. I can set you up with West Hamblin. I bloody got one, it's quite good. So he went, Oh, all right, well, do you want to just do it for us and we'll pay you some money to do it? So I thought I said to lads, look, do you want to do it? I said we might as well, you know, because it's not like we're making much money, and this will just expose us to a bigger audience because they've got a huge existing audience, and they are really good blokes and they're so straight down the line, you know, like you you have no qualms about going into any sort of business relationship with them because you couldn't meet two kind of more straight down the line honest blokes, you know, and it's so fuss-free working with them, and that they're really, you know, they're they're those two guys. I've I've got a lot of time for them, and I think what they've done with West Ham Way is really excellent, and we're just a small part of that. But I've got to say, it's one of the biggest highlights of my week is sitting down with George and Roshayne to do that podcast. I I absolutely love it. And just going back to what I said about the role West Ham plays in your life, you know, I just love I just love being part of like West Ham in any capacity. Do you know what I mean? And I I get a kick out of it if I go to the ground and people come up to me and say, I listen to pod. It doesn't happen often, but and it's not what I'm in it for, but for me, just constantly meeting new people through any means, like meeting YouTube today. I don't know about YouTube, but I meet any West Ham fan and I feel a natural kinship. Do you know what I mean? And I and I'm just delighted to meet West Ham fans whenever I do in any walk of life. I just love it. It's weird. I suppose it's our rel I've never been particularly religious or at all religious, really, but I can see that that's maybe our I don't know, if you're Christian, maybe it's the same thing.

SPEAKER_03 36:02

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

Do we have a look or something, Stan? You just go, uh, it's a poor suffering sod, you know, he supports West Hampton, Manchester River.

SPEAKER_01 36:10

I do think, uh, you know, having lived in London my whole life, as you have, so you might feel the same thing. I think I can tell by looking at people what London club they support. I know what an Arsenal fan looks like. Although, fuck me, that suddenly there's about a million more of them every day. Probably not, yeah. I know what a Guna looks like, I know what a Spurs fan looks like, I know what a Chelsea fan looks like. You know, I can spot him, and I think I do have a good regard of someone I've I don't think he's definitely West Ham, but I usually think there's a strong sense I think he could be West Ham. I'm gonna move in and test the water.

SPEAKER_03 36:45

It's very special talent, that is. Yeah, absolutely. Let's um let's end on some quick fire rounds. We ask all our guests um the same set of questions and just sort of about their their West Ham love and a bit of history as well. So, yeah, what what was the first West Ham game you ever attended?

SPEAKER_01 37:00

That was West Ham versus Newcastle at Upton Park in 1984. I was eight, and it was with yeah, it was my mate's birthday. Those the lads I was talking to right at the beginning of this of this thing. It was a mate's birthday, one of their dads took us. I think we won 2-0. I think it was Bobby Barnes and maybe Tony Cottie, and I bought a pair of West Ham gloves on the way from Upton Park station to the ground, and I remember they were like cost me four quid, and I was astonished by how expensive they were, and so was the dad who was Scottish. He went, four quid? What's that? Two pound of glove. I don't know where they are now.

SPEAKER_03 37:40

Who has been your favourite ever West Ham player? This is a tough one.

SPEAKER_01 37:44

I but I'd probably say Julian Dix because he was like, you know, in that era. I think that Julian Dix, the way he played, was so sensationally exciting. People remember him sometimes for the wrong reason, like as a hard man, all this sort of stuff. But there was something exciting about the way he played because he was a rampaging player, you know. I'd compare him to Stephen Gerard in his style of play, the way that he could dominate a game and rampage forward and score wonder goals, but he was doing it from left back, not from centre mid, and that is incredible. So I've had a lot of favourites over the years. Cotti would be the closest in that he was my first love, so to speak. But I I think probably on balance is Julian.

SPEAKER_03 38:25

What's the best West Ham game you've ever seen?

SPEAKER_01 38:28

Well, I think my favourite experience at a game has to be Prague, which is quite boring. But I w I was at that game with two of my best mates, and the feeling of that night was incredible. But before that, there was a League Cup game I went to, I think in 1990. I'm just trying to Google it now, but people who were there will remember. It's weird, but it was like 1990 in the League Cup, and we had to play Wimbledon and when they were the crazy gang, and we had quite a tough team at the time as well, with Julian and Martin Allen in it, and it was a and it was a night game under the floodlights, and I was stood on the North Bank and I was in my school uniform because I'd gone straight from school, and it was crazy. The atmosphere was crazy, even though you know Wimbledon were a small club, it was the atmosphere almost generated by their horrible team who were there to wind us up, and we had a man sent off because someone scythed down Stuart Slater, I think it was like Eric Young or something, and then Julian Dix got revenge by cleaning out Dennis Wise, and he did that thing of getting up and not waiting for the red. He knew what he'd done, he just got up and walked off, which obviously you respect. Everyone's seeing West Ham Aggro, there'd been a big bar, like proper fist fight between the players, and we were a man down, and practically in the last minute, someone crossed the ball, and mad dog come out of nowhere and volleyed it home. And the scenes on the north bank, people say limbs nowadays, another thing that I find irritating, but that was real limbs. We're like surging down the north bank, people spilling over onto the pitch. It was amazing. And I've met and spoken to Mad Dog many times over the years and talked to him about that, and yeah, he doesn't seem that excited by me telling him that. Because I suppose players get that all the time. Oh, you made my day, you you're the most memorable. They're like, Yeah, of course. Yeah, obviously. But he does remember that goal.

SPEAKER_03 40:16

What's your favourite goal of all time? Is it is it that one or is there uh another one?

SPEAKER_01 40:20

Could be that one. I mean, there'll never be a feeling in my life like the one when Gerald Bowen scored that goal. That's the greatest moment of my life, and I I'd say it to my wife, it's better than our wedding day, it's better than the birth of either of our kids. Because those moments were great, but really the thing about having kids, it's great, but it's not the moment they're born that's great. That's actually stressful. If you're there, fucking hell, it's like so stressful. Weddings are alright, but I had to pay for the wedding. It was like I'm sort of looking around at all of these people I barely know sipping champagne at my expense. I'm like, quite a good day, it's costing me a fortune. But Jared Bowen scoring that goal in the last minute in pride. I mean, it just doesn't get any better than that. So I'm gonna have to say that. Absolutely. What's been your favourite West Ham kit over the years? I think it's the mid-80s one with the blue hoop and have co trust written in it. You know that kit? I think it was yeah, yeah. I think it was like maybe 83 to 85, something like that. That I think that might have been the first one I actually owned as well. Yeah, I can picture McCaveni in that with the yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 41:21

Yeah, who's been your favourite West Ham manager?

SPEAKER_01 41:24

Probably John Lyle is the one that I feel the most sort of unadulterated affection to. There's lots of other managers, including Moys, who, you know, I think have been great. I like I even like Pards, even Red Nat, I know that divides opinion a lot, but I have to say, in the 90s, when I was like in my 20s, teens and 20s, watching some of the teams he put together, the mad chaos of it was wonderful. So, but all of them have a downside to them as well. Whereas when I was a kid, John Lyle was like he was like the president, you know. Yeah, yeah. Even the way he looked, I just think he was so West Ham. And there's no downside. Sure, he got us relegated a couple of times, and I think probably it was the right time for him to go, probably when he got us relegated in '89. But yeah, he's the one who there's no I don't think, oh, he was great, but what about that other thing that he did that wasn't so great? So I have to say John Law.

SPEAKER_03 42:17

Yeah. What has been your the worst heartbreak you've suffered as a West Ham fan?

SPEAKER_01 42:22

Easy. Everyone must say the same. It's it's 2006, Stephen Gerrard. I was there in Cardiff, and I'll never get over that. I mean, I don't everyone listens to his West Hamford, so I don't need to explain it. I'll never get over it.

SPEAKER_03 42:33

I know it's so so frustrating about that is when when you just hear the stories of he's only kicked it because he's absolutely knackered and it's like the last thing you can do is just swing a leg at it.

SPEAKER_01 42:41

And is Scaloni still the manager of Argentina? Yes, he is. That fucker. He better not win another World Cup.

SPEAKER_03 42:50

If we were building a virtual West Dam museum right now, what item would you like to contribute to it?

SPEAKER_01 42:55

Well, I've just bought, I have it right here in my hand, so it's very fortuitous because you you you told me you were gonna ask this question, and just days ago I got off of vintage. I don't know if you go on vintage, I'm like really addicted to vintage, and it like throws things up in the algorithm constantly that you might like, and it's got to know me and it knows that I'm a sucker for West Ham crap. And I got this badge, right, that I've never seen before. I'll try, and that is from the 1980 cup final. I don't think it really is vintage because it looks too new and shiny, so it must be a reproduction. But on the badge is Trevor Brooking holding the FA Cup in one arm and a hammer in the other. And I've got a lot of silly West End nostalgia kind of memorabilia around the house. But seeing as you've asked me this week, this is my new favourite purchase. It's a big old badge. I don't know what I'm gonna pin it to. Yeah, but I'm really pleased with it. And doesn't Trevor Brooking look so handsome?

SPEAKER_03 43:50

Yeah, it kind of looks like a bit of Russian propaganda, the way you sort of hold in the Yeah, that's true. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:56

Walkers, what your country, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 43:59

So maybe. Be that fantastic. And then very last question for you, Sam. What does the West Ham way mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 44:05

Obviously, go spanded around a lot, but what Yeah, I've I've been asked this a lot, you know, like on Talksport when you go on. I often still go on Talk Sport, you know, to preview West Ham games or be like, you know, the West Ham fan. People are so cynical and irritating about it. But you know, the thing about West Ham is it traditionally we're a club who are very authentic, very committed, very passionate. And I'm not saying that there aren't other fan bases like that, because that's a mistake that teams like Newcastle and Liverpool make. You know, when you hear Liverpool fans or Newcastle fans say, the thing about this club is we're a working class club, and these lads they work all week. They work all week, and then they come to this ground on a Saturday, and that's their respite. And you think, listen, everyone works all fucking week, even Norwich City fans, you idiots. Right? This is not unique to you. So I don't want to say that, but what I do think about West Ham is that we we've got self-awareness and we've got a sense of humour. We enjoy supporting West Ham irrespective of what the outcomes. Obviously, I'm not saying we don't care about losing, we do, but I think West Ham is a is a culture that is passionate but also is a laugh. And I think, you know, one of the reasons that we despise Tottenham is that Tottenham fans are well known for being extremely self-important. I don't know if you like Only Falls and Horses, but I think of Tottenham fans as Boise from Only Falls and Horses, like this sort of aloof, misplaced arrogance where he's very serious, not amusing at all, that just thinks he's like the bollocks, but he's actually a bit of a knob, right? And I like to think of West Ham, if I had to compare him to anyone that show, it would probably be Del Boy, in as much as he's trying his best, right? He sometimes gets things a bit wrong, but he's always a bit of a laugh. There's a warmth and a humour to him. Do you know what I mean? And if he and he wants to be a millionaire, but if he isn't, he doesn't care, he's still carrying on living his life anyway. Do you know what I mean? And I think that is traditionally there are I sometimes worry that we're losing a bit of that. I sometimes worried that you know some fans did drift into taking things a bit too seriously, but I think on the whole that's what West Hamway's always meant to me.

unknown 46:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 46:16

Well, that's been brilliant. Thank you very much for your time. We've we've chatted for two hours. I feel like we could have we could have chatted for more, but I've loved I've loved it. So there we have it. We had the brilliant Mr. Sam Delaney there. What a what an absolute well, I can't say career, because as he himself what a fantastic working life. What a fantastic working life Mr. Delaney has had. An absolute pleasure to have him on the show. And and as I said on the on the interview there, we could have gone for a lot longer than two hours, I think, couldn't we?

SPEAKER_02 46:41

Yeah, if we had time and he had more time, I'm pretty sure we could have chatted for ages and ages. Maybe we'll get him back on again, we'll have him on for another two hours. Or not you know, well, we're just booking one day, just whole day. And Mr. Blobby with Mr. Oh god, that would be carnage, wouldn't it? Absolutely. Yeah, we'll ask him if Steve can get Blobby on the podcast. Yeah, get pass on the contact details.

SPEAKER_03 47:03

Okay, as is traditional with the the podcast, we'll sign off with a trivia question. It is my turn, I believe, to ask you a question this week, Max. So my question to you is Bobby Moore's testimonial match was played against which Scottish team in November 1970?

SPEAKER_02 47:20

I can tell you this, and I can tell you the score. It's Celtic and it finished 2-2. See, I thought, yeah, I thought that'll be a tricky one. I wonder if he'll get that, but do you know the only reason I know that is do you remember we both went to that football conference at Handon Park? Yes. And matey did the thing about the goals, do all the different shapes of goals and whatnot. Oh yes, yes, yes, yes. Yeah. And remember, I said, he went, What is it? And you linked into me and went, That's Upton Park. I went, It fucking is. And then I put Miano at Upton Park and he just went in that glass region next to you. He went, Yeah, it's always fucking one half around here, isn't there? It's like that. I don't know why he's turned into Taggart, but he has.

SPEAKER_03 47:52

So um Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, size of goals. I mean, there's something very I mean how the World Cup at the moment, the way the ball is landing in the net at times is quite discompopulating. The way it sort of lands and it sort of doesn't go in the way it does in the Premier League goal. It's quite interesting.

SPEAKER_02 48:05

Notice that. Uh do you see Harry Kane's goal where he just absolutely just sticks it in the top corner? You know, there's no spin on it, it's just bang.

SPEAKER_03 48:12

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 48:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:13

Okay, well, thank you very much everyone for for listening.

SPEAKER_02 48:16

Oh, sorry. Yeah, you forgot, mate. We're on the hunt still, weren't we, for our um Chilean defender Javier Margas. So if you haven't heard about this before, to give you a quick rundown again. We're under the assumption that Javier Margas is still on the run, a la John McAfee. You know, he hasn't gone back to Chile, it's all a load of bollocks, and we're gonna figure out where he is because we've got people out there. We've got sources, haven't we? We have got sources. Here's to the ground. Here's to the ground, eyes on everything, who see everything. Yes, and where's what's the latest rumour, Max? Where where was he last seen? Well, first and foremost, I think we should queue up, you know. The theme tune. The theme tune, yeah. So take it away. Where in the world is Javier Morgas? So, Andrew, where has he been seen this week? Because it's your sources who have brought this one in. Yes, yes, that's right.

SPEAKER_03 49:03

So, sources tell me that Javier Margas was last seen in Paris. France. No, Texas. Ah, it makes sense. It is the World Cup, so fair enough. Yeah, so there we go. That that's it for this week's edition of Where in the World is Javier Margas. I hope you enjoyed it. Uh stay tuned for next week for another update on where in the world is he. And and on that note, thank you very much for listening to this week's edition of the West Ham Syndrome. Hope you enjoyed it as much as we enjoyed chatting to Sam. And until next time, come on you hammers.

SPEAKER_00 49:31

Come on, you irons. You can get in touch with the show by emailing the West Ham Syndrome or lowercase at gmail.com. Thewestham syndrome at gmail.com. And connecting with the show on social media at the West Ham Syndrome. Come on, you own