Why I’ve got a beef with Ian Botham | Victoria Coren Mitchell

Last Sunday morning, Sir Ian Botham’s penis was on my doorstep.

The world is changing fast; millions of others found Sir Ian’s penis on their laptop, Kindle or mobile phone. But I still love the elegance of a printed page, so the cricket legend’s john thomas was delivered to me the old-fashioned way. At dawn. Through the letter-box. With a bang. I haven’t finished. When I woke up, I was amazed by what I found all over the mat. (I know I already said it was left on the doorstep, but let’s just assume I get two copies of the Sun on Sunday, and move on to the next paragraph.)

Last Sunday, news that Ian Botham does not suffer from erectile dysfunction was splashed across the front of Britain’s cheeriest tabloid. The great sportsman has been having impotence treatment, he “bravely revealed”, but only as a preventative measure. He urged men to throw off pride issues around penile function and confidently seek treatment for impotence – but not men like himself, because he doesn’t suffer from it. No siree. No Sir-Ian.

“I’m a male and men do have problems and you have to front up to them,” said Botham, adding: “I don’t have a problem.”

Nevertheless, Ian Botham has been undergoing Vigore Linear Shockwave Therapy. He mentioned this several times, while bravely revealing his total lack of a problem. It doesn’t say he was paid for this, although he does also appear on the website for Vigore Linear Shockwave Therapy saying: “I’m happy to recommend Vigore offered by the Regenerative Medical Group and they will provide a screening first to ensure you are suitable. Please call 0800 999 2662 or email admin@vigore.co.uk for further information.”

It’s certainly possible that Sir Ian is doing all this for free, in order to encourage men to have no shame about undergoing such treatment. After all, he is keen to see the end of the embarrassment albatross: “There’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” he assured potential patients in his interview. Not that Ian Botham would need to be embarrassed anyway, because, as he quickly clarified: “I didn’t need the treatment.”

We would already know that Ian Botham has no trouble in that department if we’d ever seen a photograph of his erect penis on Twitter, which of course we haven’t, because the person who put a photograph of their erect penis on Ian Botham’s Twitter feed with the note “What are you thinking..xx” was a hacker.

But we trust him. He volunteered to have his privates zapped with shockwaves for no motive other than insurance against the possibility of erectile problems in the future. It may sound grisly but it’s better than using Viagra, argues Sir Ian. Not that he has ever used Viagra himself. (“I have never needed to,” he explains.)

Poor men. It seems like they have to have erections all the time these days. Ubiquitous internet porn access shows a relentless gallery of unrealistic women demanding to be satisfied around the clock. The documentary Brought Up On Porn, released on BBC iPlayer last Monday, reveals that one in four new erectile dysfunction patients is under 40, which seems to reflect the anxiety created by technology.

Latest news in London is that businessman Bradley Charvet, who is launching the Fellatio Cafe in Geneva this December, now hopes to open a branch in Marylebone. Yes, it is what you think: a cafe where men can receive oral sex while having a coffee. This is an appalling, dangerous and irresponsible idea. We drink far too much coffee already.

The prospective cafe’s name is disappointing. “The Fellatio Cafe”? They’re not even trying. I myself would have called it Cup And Saucy. But even Hot Drinks would have been better.

What about Just A Splash, An Extra Shot or Mine’s A Grande? Other possibilities (I have given this some thought) include The Daily Grind, Morning Glory, French Roast, Johnny Come Lattely, Our Coffee Sucks, The Foamy Lip, A Little Bit Of Sugar In Your Bowl, Fluid, The Drip Method, Cup And Balls, Cup This and Starsucks. I’ll leave it with you. Have a nice afternoon.

Where was I? Ah yes. I’m sure this ghastly cafe won’t open, though it really is opening in Geneva, but the very idea that a normal man might be expected to perform under such circumstances adds to the general taxing expectations (and the word “perform” itself is a stressful one, which should probably be phased out.)

So Ian Botham’s interview in last Sunday’s Sun was not “brave” at all: it was weedy, unhelpful and wrong. Correctly or incorrectly, people will assume he was paid for his Vigore endorsement and people are pretty media-savvy. They’ll know a company like that would look long and hard (yes, yes) for a celebrity who suffered from erectile dysfunction and the closest they could evidently find is someone who’s careful to state over and over again that he definitely doesn’t. The company could find nobody who would talk openly about it without this tub-thumping proviso. And celebrities will do anything.

Therefore the notion that it’s taboo is emphatically reinforced! And it’s reinforced alongside the weird possibility of extra guilt and regret for any impotent men who didn’t have shockwave treatment as a “preventative measure”.

Of course there should be no shame in this sort of thing. The human body is a beautiful, complicated, interesting ecosystem; glitches happen. Impotence causes such terrible sadness, loneliness and frustration, it’s a proper wide-scale tragedy that thoughts of ignominy and humiliation prevent anyone from either seeking help or living a proud and happy life regardless.

That Ian Botham would despise the idea of anyone thinking he has “a problem”, yet agree to be the man who talks publicly about impotence anyway … if there is shame in anything, it’s that.

Why I’ve got a beef with Ian Botham | Victoria Coren Mitchell

Ian Botham interview: I could not pay a visit to my father when he was dying from dementia

“I did not want my memory of him to be distorted by the illness that robbed him of himself.”

Sir Ian, who has a son, two daughters and five grandchildren, made sure they stayed away. He urged his mom to do the same, but she couldn’t fairly deliver herself to turn her back on her husband, in spite of the truth the man she visited bore no resemblance to her devoted husband or wife.

“By the finish, my dad was as close to to a zombie as you can envision,” says Sir Ian. “He had no handle of his bodily functions, no concept who my mum was. Even a 6-month-outdated would have had greater comprehension of what’s going on due to the fact at least a infant understands when to consume.”

Sir Ian is speaking for the 1st time in Britain about his father’s death from Alzheimer’s condition in 2005 — he talked about it earlier this yr in an interview in Australia — to help National Dementia Week.

About 800,000 men and women suffer from dementia in Britain, in accordance to the Alzheimer’s Society. In most circumstances, it is brought on by Alzheimer’s, a progressive ailment that damages the brain. Responding to increasing concern, the Government has pledged to double funding for analysis to discover a remedy or effective treatment by 2025. Sir Ian claims he has never previously broached the subject because “it’s not the sort of issue you deliver up in a bar consuming with your mates”. But there was also an component of embarrassment not for himself but on behalf of Les.

“My dad would have been mortified if he had known what sort of humiliation lay ahead,” he says, quietly, casting his gaze out the window. “He would have thrown himself off a cliff rather than finish up the way he did.”

Sitting in a riverside hotel beside the Thames, exactly where he invested the evening with his wife, Kath, Sir Ian, 58, who lives in Ravensworth, North Yorks, has aged well. Rugged and handsome, he wears a clunky gold IWC observe on his wrist he is a brand ambassador for the Swiss marque and for Jaguar autos, which speaks volumes about the perceived top quality of the Botham brand.

“I collect a whole lot of traditional watches, much to the horror of my wife,” he says. “But these are investments that you can get pleasure from ahead of passing on to children or grandchildren.”

On the other arm is a hi-tech Jawbone action monitor that measures his bodily output and tracks his fitness. Sir Ian’s fundraising on behalf of Beefy’s Charity Foundation, which has raised about £10 million for leukaemia and lymphoma analysis, involves gruellingly long walks in excess of challenging terrain he when undertook Hannibal’s march across the Alps on foot.

He started out his charity work soon after an damage in 1977 left him attending physiotherapy every day for 6 weeks at a hospital in Taunton. To attain the division, he walked by way of a children’s ward exactly where the individuals have been dying of leukaemia and related diseases.

“These young lads would be sitting around, playing board video games, looking quite standard – no tubes or drips – but by the time my treatment was over, they had been dead. I had to do anything.”

Botham was always a guy who meant company. On the pitch, in the words of a hyperbolic commentator, he brought “fire and rapture”.

^{Sir Ian Botham with his mother Marie and father Les soon after recieving the Griffin Trophy (John Walters)}

For the duration of a 15-yr Check profession of 102 matches, he took 383 wickets, scored 5,200 runs and took 120 catches.

A single of the undisputed globe-class gamers in the England side of the Eighties, Sir Ian could turn a match single-handedly.

His greatest private performances came in the course of England’s triumphant 1981 Ashes campaign towards Australia.

In the Headingley Check, he produced a match-winning 149 not out and his ferocious 118 in the 2nd innings at Old Trafford has been described as 1 of the ideal Test innings ever.

Off-pitch he was no significantly less fiery and in his youth he had a track record as a hellraiser.

He was outed some many years in the past as obtaining had a two-year affair. Sir Ian’s son, Liam, informed Piers Morgan’s Existence Stories that he had been neither a really great husband nor a particularly excellent father.

“He was most likely right,” says Sir Ian bluntly. “As a father, you’re supposed to be there for your youngsters, but due to my profession, I couldn’t be.

“As far as becoming a husband goes, we all make blunders and I would say that Kath and I are now stronger and closer than we’ve ever been.”

House plays a main position in Sir Ian’s existence he walks, he fishes, he will take element in charity events and revels in currently being a hands-on grandfather.

“I spoil my grandkids, which, as a grandparent, is only appropriate and proper,” he says with a grin. “But they also know they will have to work difficult in existence to get where they want to be.”

This summertime he will be commentating on the fortunes of England’s cricketers, a line-up he describes as “a perform in progress”.

“It’s a new coach, new gamers, a new script,” he stated. “You have to carry on younger gamers — I keep in mind myself aged 19 and feeling annoyed that I was much better than the guys playing in front of me — the cracks have been appearing.

“I feel this side will do a good deal better than England have accomplished in excess of the previous twelve months. We received slaughtered in Australia, which was humiliating. We really do not want that to come about yet again.”

Since his retirement, Sir Ian has loved fame as the encounter of Shredded Wheat, in an advertisement that also featured his grandchildren.

Searching back a generation, Sir Ian says he observed that when his father was in his mid-70s he occasionally appeared vague and forgetful, practically nothing more.

“If you asked him what he planned to do these days, he may possibly reply with, ‘I’m going over the hills and far away’,” says Sir Ian. “Mum took him to the GP but dementia wasn’t diagnosed due to the fact the early stages are difficult to determine.”

But it slowly became clear that Les was struggling from a lot more than the odd “senior moment”. The penny ultimately dropped for his son on the green at Yeovil Golf Club.

“My dad appeared fine, but as he stood more than the ball, he turned to me and asked ‘What do I do now?’ with genuine bafflement,” says Sir Ian.

“The man taught me to perform golf when I was three, but he had forgotten how to perform it.” A diagnosis quickly followed.

“My dad had been an officer in the Navy and a fine sportsman, and watching him deteriorate was appalling,” he says. “We kept him at house and brought in carers. I took him to my property in Spain, to see if the modify of air would do him excellent we had to travel by personal jet as he couldn’t have coped with an airport.”

The trip was not a achievement. Sir Ian’s swimming pool featured a tiled crocodile motif on the bottom Les was too frightened to walk across it.

On the journey residence, he lay down on the floor of the plane and refused to stand up. “We realised we would have to send him to hospital,” says Sir Ian. “He required care we couldn’t provide he would turn into violent and have to be restrained to have a shower. Later on, he needed to be sedated.”

One of Sir Ian’s last recollections of his father, then aged 82, was of him “shuffling about the ward, holding the hand of any person who occurred to be passing”.

“There’s a saying that you come into the planet as a kid and you depart as 1, and that was correct for my father,” says Sir Ian. “There was no point going to see him because he got no comfort from it he didn’t know who he was never ever mind who I was.”

Sir Ian believes his mother’s death, in 2012 was hastened by the agonising ordeal of viewing her husband die.

“Dementia brings about the organs to shut down, and in an infirm, elderly particular person, that can occur fairly rapidly. But my father was so physically fit that it took a lengthy time for his physique to fail,” he says.

“My mum aged many years, she would cry following every single check out, emotionally exhausted. Afterwards she stated she wished she had taken my suggestions and stored away. That is the terrible factor about dementia you observe somebody die twice in excess of.”

Ian Botham interview: I could not pay a visit to my father when he was dying from dementia