Press and Podcasts

Historic England’s video of the Jack Leslie Blue Plaque unveiling

In May 2025, Historic England unveiled a new Blue Plaque for footballer Jack Leslie in Plymouth. Leslie was the first black player to be selected for England, but he was dropped from the squad without explanation in a race-based act. This video, which includes an interview with me, covers the unveiling and Jack’s story.

The English Heritage Podcast: Heroes of the 1924 Paris Olympics (2024)

In the run-up to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, I joined English Heritage’s Blue Plaques historian Howard Spencer on the English Heritage Podcast to discuss the Paris Olympics of one century earlier, 1924. We explored the stories of the Britons who were involved with Paris 1924 who have commemorative Blue Plaques in London.

James Rogers’ Warfare: World Wars & World Cups (2022)

In 2022, around the time of the FIFA Men’s World Cup in Qatar, I joined James Rogers for an episode of his Warfare podcast that focused on sportswashing. While the term itself wasn’t coined until 2015, the idea of despotic rulers and authoritarian regimes using large-scale sporting events to help cleanse their global image has been in practice for nearly a century. In this podcast, we explore this history, the relationship between authoritarian regimes and Premier League football clubs, look at what the Nazis got right about the 1936 Olympics, and whether sportswashing really does work.

BSSH Sport in History Podcast: Documenting the Olympics (2021)

In 2021, the British Society of Sports History, in conjunction with the British Library and De Montfort University, hosted a two-day conference called Documenting the Olympics and Paralympics. I gave one of the keynote lectures, in which I explored my career in archival research: ‘From Wandsworth to Woodhorn via Wenlock, and points in between: an Olympic and Paralympic research journey, 1987-2021’. The session was chaired by Dr Raf Nicholson of Bournemouth University.

Dan Snow’s History Hit: The Olympic Games (2021)

Dan Snow hosted me on his History Hit podcast in 2021 to tie in with that year’s Tokyo Olympic Games. We explored many themes in the history of the Olympics. How did it become the international sporting event it is today? How have the games affected global politics and diplomacy? And how is Shakespeare connected to its history?’

Historic England Podcast: Irreplaceable: A History of England in 100 Places (2018)

I joined presenter Emma Barnett and Historic England’s Deborah Lamb in four episodes of the Historic England podcast on the 100 places that tell England’s story. These episodes focused on sites from sport history, as selected by Paralympian Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson.