5Q | Reshmin Chowdhury: “Spurs – it’s just part of your identity, isn’t it?”
Presenter, broadcaster and journalist Reshmin Chowdhury is known to millions for her work on talkSPORT, TNT Sports and co-hosting global events like the The Best FIFA Football Awards or the UEFA Champions League draw.
She's also a lifelong Spurs fan, born around the corner at North Middlesex Hospital, who lived in Walthamstow and first stepped into White Hart Lane aged 11.
Reshmin is also co-presenting our new podcast The Hotspur Way in partnership with Sports Illustrated, alongside fellow Spurs fan, Adam Smith – the latest episodes Andy Robertson and legendary former defender Toby Alderweireld are available now.
Q1 | Why Spurs?
Reshmin: “Firstly, I was born at North Middlesex Hospital, just around the corner from White Hart Lane. I lived in Walthamstow for my first seven years, very much Spurs territory. Then, as I started watching football, so from the age of 11, it was the team of Gazza and Gary Lineker, 1990. That's where the love affair started. My brother was already a Spurs fan, so it was very easy to sort of kind of tag onto his Spurs leanings. It all made sense geographically and those were the star players that I absolutely fell in love with. It all stemmed from there.”
Q2 | What is your first Spurs memory?
Reshmin: “My first big Spurs memory was the 1991 FA Cup Final, Des Walker's own goal, us winning it, Gazza, all of that. Off the back of the 1990 World Cup, Spurs were in the ascendancy, huge players in our team. Yes, that was my first, big Spurs memory.”
Q3| The quickfire round…
3a | Favourite player?
Reshmin: “Gazza, if it's from my early days, Gareth Bale, Harry Kane. It's definitely Gazza from the start, then Gareth, I loved watching him, and then moving through my timeline, I would say it's Harry, just because… I feel like we all grew with Harry, it's the romantic football story, isn't it?”
3b | Cult hero?
Reshmin: “Nayim. I remember where I was when he scored that goal in the Cup Winners’ Cup Final (1995) against Arsenal. I was quite young at that time, I remember being around a family friend’s house and the game was on terrestrial TV. They weren’t into football at all, but it was on, I was watching and I turned my head at exactly the time Nayim scored from the half-way line. So, Nayim’s my cult hero.”
3c | Favourite kit?
Reshmin: “Oh, for me, Holsten, early 1990s, 1991 FA Cup Final.”
3d | Favourite Spurs moment?
Reshmin: “I saw a clip of Lucas Moura's hat-trick against Ajax the other day. I just don't think there's any other moment that has every single Spurs fan on their knees and in tears. I enjoyed that more than I enjoyed the final, obviously, not because of the outcome, but because of what it meant. That’s the emotion of live sport. That is the emotion of being a fan, the emotion of seeing your team reach the heights that they deserve to reach. Every single bit of that story is incredible.”
Q4 | Where were you when… Lucas scored his hat-trick against Ajax?
Reshmin: “Well, interestingly… I actually did all the pre-match interviews (for TNT Sports) in Amsterdam. I remember interviewing Hugo Lloris the night before the game, talking about turning around the (0-1) deficit from the first leg and he seemed fairly confident. I don't think he could have imagine what would happen. So, I was there the night before, but on the night of the game, I was covering Arsenal in the Europa League in Valencia! So, I was in Valencia with Jamie Weir (Sky Sports), Vaishali Bhardwaj (TV presenter) and Jamie and I, plus one of our cameramen, Ben, are all Spurs fans. The emotion of that night, we were jumping up and down, all of us in tears. There we were, covering Arsenal for TV, but watching us qualify for the Champions League Final. The irony of it was not lost on me. It was incredible.”
Finally, what does Tottenham Hotspur mean to you?
Reshmin: “Spurs mean so much. Even in the bad times, they always pull me back in. That's when you know that they're your team. Ultimately, you love them. It's all my early football memories. I was always the only girl watching football. Me, my brother, all of our mates that we grew up with. I was always the only girl who would watch every single game. People would be at our house most of the time, they'd all congregate at ours and we'd always watch football together. The people I grew up with, when they see the career I do now, none of them are surprised because they've seen me from that early age watching football with them. So, yeah. It's just part of your identity, really, isn't it?”