CHRIS Kamara has revealed he is going for a brain scan next week after his wife urged him to get checked for dementia.
Asked on Steph’s Packed Lunch today if he was worried, the 63-year-old star replied: “No – I’ve had a great life.”
The Sky Sports and Ninja Warrior UK host, who was a footballer in the 80s and 90s, spoke openly about his wife Anne’s concerns.
It comes after Gary Lineker called for football to ban heading in training because players are three and a half times more likely to suffer from a brain disorder.
Steph, 38, told him: “Kammy, we’ve talked about this on the show before. Your wife Anne has been worried about you.”
He replied: “I’m going for a scan next Monday in Pontefract – Ponte Carlo.
“We’d talked about it on the programme so I went home and she went: ‘You’re blasé aren’t you? You think you’ve had a fabulous career and if it all ended tomorrow that would be fine.’
“I was like ‘yeah’ and she said: ‘What about the grandkids, what about me? Go and get it checked. There might be something you can do.'”
Chris added: “It’s a precaution. It’s not part of the ageing process. I – and I’m sure loads of other people – thought you start to lose your memory. You think: ‘Well I’m getting old’ but it’s not a case of that.”
Steph told him: “You just want to make sure everything’s all right.
“It’s good that you’ve got Anne there supporting you through all that because she’s right isn’t she – you’ve got think about the family?”
Chris replied: “I’m sure people will say: ‘Well, other diseases are worse’ but you’re there but you’re not there if you get dementia, which is horrible.”
The host asked: “Are you worried about it?”
He told her: “No. As I say I’ve had a great life.”
Sounding shocked, Steph replied sternly: “Listen, you’re not going anywhere yet, Kammy.”
However, the star stopped short of calling for headers to be banned from football – insisting it would “ruin” the game.
Chris and wife Anne have been married for 38 years after tying the knot in 1982. They have two grown-up sons, Ben and Jack.
