Forget Me Notts

So everyone knows footballers are monumentally stupid, it’s pretty much a given. It isn’t like you have to be a moron to want to play football, far from it, but the point is that to make it at the very top level you have to do it often to the detriment of your studies. If you’re good enough, you’re old enough, and these days that normally means being selected by a top club before reaching the teenage abyss. If it’s a choice between football and maths, what are you gonna choose, especially at that kind of age?

Prepare to be shocked then that a footballer is currently triumphing on student afternoon haven, Countdown, where you have to do ridiculously hard things like anagrams and long division. Notts County midfielder Neil MacKenzie has made history as the first footballer to appear on the Channel 4 quiz, famous more for its strangely alluring nerdy women than its intellectual merit. MacKenzie is proving a hit on the show, against all odds, and has actually won five episodes in a row, shooting to the top of the leaderboard. “He's proving to be a strong contestant and has a broad vocabulary which is essential to do well,” said associate producer Kate Horton helpfully. Amazingly that vocabulary extends beyond, “I got the fucking ball” and “you need glasses you fucking cheat,” before you make that joke.

If you’re unemployed today then, make sure you check out the midfielder this afternoon as he looks to continue his reign in the Champion’s Chair, aiming for a sixth win. He is currently just three wins away from the maximum of eight wins, where apparently you reach something called ‘Octochamp’ status. Conjecture that this is celebrated by getting a rusty trombone off Carol Vorderman has yet to be confirmed or denied by the show’s media officers.