WHAT I’M CALLED: Out of work: Malcolm Fretter, and at work MOG (Miserable Old Git). I actually do do pretty serious stuff as a volunteer advisor at the Independent Advice Centre in Wantage.
MY AGE: Over 65 and still counting.
WHAT I DO: Voluntary work. I have been administering Vale of White Horse Primary Schools’ Football Association for 46 years. And also I’m an advisor at the Independent Advice Centre in Wantage where I have been for 16 years.
WHERE I LIVE: I have lived in East Hendred, Oxfordshire, for 16 years.
WHO I LOVE: My wife Pauline, followed at some distance by our dog – an adopted guide dog puppy Yazz.
She was withdrawn from the guide dog training scheme because she was so desperately ill with puppy head glands.
HAPPIEST YEAR: 1968, the year I got married in Leicestershire.
DARKEST MOMENT: Leicester Tigers losing the Heineken Cup Finals in 1997, 2007 and 2009. I went to watch the first one in Cardiff.
I felt dreadful after that one because we were so poor. I’ve supported the team since I started playing rugby myself at 12.
PROUDEST BOAST: Lighting the cauldron at South Park, Oxford, on July 9 as an Olympic Torchbearer – the final one in Oxford. This is followed by the fact that I had England Schools’ Under-19 rugby trials. I played fullback at that level.
WORST WEAKNESS: Pushing up ramps – nowadays. I was paralysed in 1971 due to a severe spinal bleed and before the days of scans.
LESSONS LEARNED: Thanks to my late father Sid I learnt not to follow in his footsteps as a farmer.
I grew up on a farm in Leicestershire - I was lucky.
It was the best childhood anyone could have, but I wouldn’t do the job. It was a seven-day-a-week farm. Cows had to be milked at 5am and again at 6pm. You never got a holiday.
DULLEST JOB: Holiday job in 1964 at Butlins in Pwllheli working as a dish washing machine operator All you did was you lugged great trays and put them in enormous dishwashers. I’ve never been so fit in my life, but I was bored to tears.
GREATEST SHAME: That my father did not live long enough to see me become a headteacher. I was headteacher at Sunningwell Primary School in the 1980s.
LIFELONG HERO: Former England and Leicester rugby captain Martin Johnson. I met him in 2001 when we won the Heineken Cup.
OLDEST FRIEND: Len Sharman, my best friend at primary school. We are still in touch. Not as regularly as either us would like, though.
WIDEST SMILE: When listening to I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue on Radio Four.
FAVOURITE DREAM: I never dream at all. And if you can remember a dream it’s not a dream.
BIGGEST REGRET: That Len Sharman and myself were separated by the evil 11+ examination. It’s the most discriminatory thing invented.
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