Brilliant all-rounder Andrew Flintoff is a natural fit for Australian Ninja Warrior 2020

Since bowing to a broken body after the 2009 Ashes, Andrew Flintoff has made a transition as remarkable as any of his on-field feats.

It’s hard to imagine one of the most loved and explosive cricketers the game has known becoming an even better all-rounder in retirement, but “Freddie” has done so seemingly without trying.

Even over the phone, during a break filming Australian Ninja Warrior at the Melbourne Showgrounds, it’s clear why.

Flintoff – England hero and breaker of Australian hearts – is warm, funny, engaging and blessed with a generosity of spirit that fills his 193-centimetre frame. 

It’s as if he was born to be on television, and those feats of cricketing derring-do were merely killing time. Not that he agrees.

“I feel like I’m an ex-cricketer – and that’s how I want to feel,” Flintoff says. “I stumbled into the TV world, did a couple of shows; people thought they were all right, so I pursued it some more. Now I’ve been doing it for over 10 years.

“Don’t get me wrong, I love it and I’m thankful – the jobs I’ve had from Ninja Warrior to Top Gear, A League of Their Own and various others have been brilliant. But I’d swap it all to be a cricketer again.”

Some things he wouldn’t trade for anything, not least a family back home in Manchester that continues to grow, which he returned to soon after filming started for Ninja Warrior, due to the coronavirus outbreak in UK. Brownlow medallist has Shane Crawford stepped into the role for the remainder of the season.

Already parents to Holly, Corey and Rocky, he and wife Rachael recently welcomed their fourth child, Preston. Flintoff is thrilled, reckoning it will be a good chance to test how well he’s managing his work-life balance.

A significant step has been getting on top of his mental health, which started with acknowledging he was unwell.

“I’d known for a long time that something wasn’t quite right, but I just couldn’t put my finger on it. I’ve got friends who’ve suffered depression and had mental-health issues. I could always identify with them, even though I didn’t know what it was with me.

“It’s a bit of a cliche when people say, ‘It’s good to talk’, but it genuinely is. Surround yourself with good people who care for you, who you’re able to talk to – definitely the first step. So is laughter and fun.”

He struggles with the label “stigma”, believing it can create one unnecessarily. He welcomes a changed environment where people feel they can put their hand up and say they’re struggling, but he knows there’s still much progress to be made.

There’s some crossover in another current project, a BBC documentary on eating disorders – especially in men – that draws inspiration from Flintoff’s struggles with bulimia. It’s another traditionally taboo subject that he kept hidden until 2014. 

Once, during a players’ group session with a dietician, he almost spoke up. The dietician said there obviously wouldn’t be anything like that in the England dressing room and moved the conversation on.

“It’s about trying to break down barriers in all these types of areas, so people can ultimately go around being themselves, talk about how they feel, talk about what bothers them,” says Flintoff. “It’s about almost challenging – especially for men – the very notion of masculinity.”

Once the pin-up of the pint-swilling terraces, he hasn’t had a drink in more than five years. Where he used to be out with mates until all hours, Flintoff now catches up with them at the gym each morning. Having struggled to adopt an athlete’s discipline in his early England days, he looks fit enough to go around again.

He laughs that if a younger version of himself had pondered how he’d look at 42, actor John Candy might have come to mind. He recalls sitting with good mate Steve Harmison, looking around the room at teammates Alastair Cook “with all these abs, biceps and all sorts” and fast bowler Simon Jones “who’s carved out of granite”, and thinking, “The game’s changed.

“I said, ‘We’ve got our bellies hanging over our trousers and we’re getting changed in the bathroom so that no one sees us. We’re coming to the end here, Steve’.”

In truth, other than a knee that was “in absolute bits and irreparable”, Flintoff left the Test cricket arena at 31 in good shape – bowling faster than ever, and still capable of the feats that made him the player of that legendary 2005 Ashes series which changed his life.

He thinks people underestimate how much he trained to play cricket, just as children Corey and Rocky don’t think he has anything to offer when he tries to coach them.

By the time he won the inaugural Australian version of I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here in 2015, Flintoff was already an established TV personality in the UK, the host of a radio show, brand ambassador for a men’s fashion label, and the face of a supermarket chain. He seemed a natural at anything he tried, even Elvis impersonations while playing T20 cricket. His recent contribution to resuscitating the cult classic Top Gear has swelled his popularity even more.

He remains seemingly unchanged – up to a point. “You know what, it’s a terrible thing to say, but I’m a little bit more aware of how I look,” Flintoff confesses. “When I played cricket, I just wanted to shave my head so that I didn’t have to comb my hair. Now, you’ve got to scrub up a bit more for telly.”

He feels privileged to be the one to interview the ninjas after they’ve tackled each course, teasing out the stories of ordinary people who are often battling their own demons or dealing with loss. He’s a fan of the underdog, like Tom Nicholson, who Flintoff dubbed the ‘Ginger Ninja’. “You find yourself getting wrapped up in someone and being so desperate for them to do well.”

He remembers watching Top Gear as a boy and is moved to think the “other world” of television is now such a big part of his. 

“The nice thing about Ninja is it’s an escape; you can sit around as a family and there’s something there for everybody. Top Gear as well – entertainment that’s centred around cars. It takes you into a different world for a while, and hopefully puts a smile on people’s faces.”

Australian Ninja Warrior airs Sunday at 7pm and Monday at 7.30pm on Nine and 9Now.

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