Jamie O'Hara's Holiday Disaster: Food Poisoning from Cheese on Toast
Jamie O’Hara headed to Portugal chasing the usual summer clichés – sun on his back, sand between his toes, a bit of Algarve nightlife. Instead, the talkSPORT regular has ended up flat on his back in a hospital bed in Albufeira, taken down by the most unlikely of culprits.
Cheese on toast.
The former Tottenham midfielder revealed on Instagram that his holiday had turned sour on Wednesday night, posting a photo from hospital with a drip in his right arm and a caption that sounded as if it had been written through gritted teeth.
“Got food poisoning from cheese on toast in Albufeira,” he wrote.
For a man who has spent the last year mocking Spurs’ mishaps, it was a very Tottenham way to suffer. An “absolute stinker”, as he later called it.
Back in the talkSPORT studio, disbelief quickly replaced sympathy. Breakfast hosts Shebahn Aherne and Gabby Agbonlahor could not get their heads around the idea that such a basic snack could floor a grown man.
“Is that possible?” Agbonlahor asked on air.
“I don’t think it is possible,” Aherne replied. “I think he’s had something dodgy before the cheese on toast.”
Agbonlahor then twisted the knife, painting a picture that listeners could almost see.
“He took his own cheese over to Portugal with him, it’s gone off and he’s eaten it, and got food poisoning?”
The pair tried to make sense of it. Aherne floated listeriosis as a potential explanation, pointing to NHS guidance that soft, mould-ripened cheeses like camembert and brie can leave you feeling very unwell. Hardly the glamorous side of Algarve dining.
While the studio laughed, O’Hara was in no mood for punchlines. He sent in a video update that underlined just how grim his situation had become.
“Boys, it’s not good, I’m in a bad place,” he said. “I can’t come on, I am struggling. I’m out in Portugal, I’ve got food poisoning from cheese on toast.
“You’ll love this one as well, the restaurant that I got it from, do you know what it’s called? Fat Cats… Fat, Cats! Honestly, absolute stinker. I’m dying. Sums me up, doesn’t it?”
The name of the restaurant only added to the sense of farce. So did his appearance.
“He is whiter than a ghost by the way!” Aherne told listeners after seeing the clip.
“He doesn’t look well, does he?” Agbonlahor admitted, the laughter finally giving way to concern. “I want to apologise for laughing at you Jamie.”
For talkSPORT regulars, O’Hara’s misfortune instantly brought one man to mind: Jason Cundy. The pair front The Sports Bar together, a late-night mix of football chat and wind-ups that has made them one of the station’s most familiar double acts.
The Premier League season will soon drag them both back into the studio. For now, though, Cundy’s role is more old friend than on-air provocateur – and Agbonlahor knew exactly what might lift O’Hara’s spirits.
“Do you know what he might need while he’s sitting there in hospital?” he asked. “Jason Cundy, ‘Has anyone seen cheese?!’ That’ll cheer him up!”
O’Hara will not see the funny side yet. Food poisoning on holiday is bad enough. Food poisoning from cheese on toast at a place called Fat Cats, while your colleagues dissect it live on national radio, is another level entirely.
But once the drip is out, the colour returns and the flight home is done, this is a story made for late-night radio. The kind of self-inflicted disaster that The Sports Bar lives on.
When he’s back behind the microphone, you suspect nobody will dine out on it more than Jamie O’Hara himself.
