Revisited: The life and times of Nicky Bandini – Football Weekly

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Hello, Football Weekly fans.

Max here from a busy railway station in Paris.

Anyway,

while we're having a couple of weeks off, we're going to play a few of our Life and Times episodes.

Today's is Nikki Bandini's.

Her story is fascinating.

And if you haven't heard it before, really worth listening to.

And if you have heard it before, worth listening to again.

So I hope you enjoy it.

And we'll be back soon.

Cheers.

Hello and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

Today, another in the Life and Times series that you enjoyed during the pandemic.

I guess there wasn't much on, but we like making them and learning about our panelists.

This episode is all about Nikki Bandini.

So expect to hear about mid-90s Arsenal, football Italia and living in the US.

As most of you know, Nikki came out publicly as transgender about four years ago.

We will of course discuss that, but this is about her love of football and the journey in the game that has led her to be sitting on a Zoom call with me and Barry right now.

This is the Guardian Football Weekly.

Barry, hello.

Hello.

Hi, Nikki.

How are you?

I'm all right.

Yeah.

I'm a bit nervous.

It's weird talking yourself.

Yeah.

Like, I do know, like, it's, it's so silly, but like, as a journalist, like, you spend all your time talking about other people.

And like, when the lens is turned on you, it's, it's a bit different.

Yeah.

I didn't want to, in the intro, it made it sound like all your career had been leading to the moment where you were on a Zoom call with me and Barry.

It has, obviously.

Of course, a career highlight.

Lots of people got in touch.

DB says, no questions.

Looking forward to this one.

I listen to every Football Weekly, but I hit download with greater urgency when Nikki is on.

I really enjoy the way she thinks about football.

So I agree with that, actually.

I don't sound surprised, but I also like how all the panelists think about football as I cover myself.

A storyteller opening the door to new and imaginative ways of loving the game.

So no pressure, Nikki.

Let's start with an easy one there.

I feel like I sort of should know these things about panelists, but I don't.

Where were you born?

Where did you grow up?

So I was born in London, grew up in London.

My dad is Italian.

He grew up in Italy and moved to Italy when he was in his 20s, met my mum and they stayed in London.

So yeah,

I was born and grew up in London.

Whereabouts?

All over, really.

I mean, sort of West-ish mostly, but like we

moved seven times, I think, between me being born and me going to university.

So like we moved a lot.

I was born in North London, but yeah, we really bounced around.

And your earliest memories of football?

Yeah, I think it's a bit hard, isn't it?

Because I don't know if other people have like more clearly like boxed memories than I do.

I think like when I sort of go to like a certain bit of youth, it's all a bit blurry.

But I'm pretty sure my first memory of of football is really like the 1990 World Cup.

Um, because that's the first time when I remember like

really paying attention to it.

And I, again, like, this is this is still pretty young, so I don't remember it very clearly, but I remember the sort of thing of everyone being around the telly together and watching this big sporting event.

And I really remember the third, fourth game almost more than the games before.

I remember the games before it, like, a little bit, and I sort of always wonder with memories like that, how much do I remember it, and how much have I just re-watched it as an an adult and sort of superimpose those things?

But I really remember the third fourth game because

there was this big discussion in the household about whether we were going to support England or Italy.

Because I've got an older brother and I've got an Italian dad and I've got an English mum.

And so like you had to like pick a side.

And I'm sure you didn't, but it felt like you definitely did as a kid.

And

I picked Italy.

And I don't have like a really

like logical because I was six.

Well, Well, six or when

was the fourth game?

My birthday son was six or seven years old.

I just realised I was just completely like literally giving people my exact age there, which is not a thing I'd intended to do.

There you go.

Yeah,

I chose Italy and I felt like it was because of like a few characters.

Like, I know everyone was crazy for Scalatchi.

My dad was crazy for Scalatchi.

I really loved Walter Senger.

And I remember having been sort of quite affronted because people got quite angry about him after they went out.

But I liked him because he was very, very,

I think as a kid, I was very drawn to quite like extroverted people, like people who stood out.

And like Zenga had that thing of like on the pitch, like you noticed him, like obviously like goalkeepers, you notice more anyway, because they're different, like they're the ones who are different to everyone else.

But he also had a way of doing it that was very sort of on the front foot, you know, making himself visible, coming out more than he probably should have done sometimes.

And

that I was drawn to.

And I think probably on top of that, there was like another part of it, which is just like my older brother was sort of by character, a bit more sort of quiet than I was.

And in our household, somehow this got sort of told as a story of, well, it's English to be reserved and quiet and it's Italian to be outspoken and loud.

So he chose England, did he?

I mean, I don't.

He did.

Yeah.

I think he's, I think he's, I think he's switched over the years because, I mean, we watched the 2006 final together and he was unambiguous in enjoying that.

And honestly, like, when I've talked to him more recently about it, I think he, I think he finds it easier to support in Italy than England as well.

So you sort of chose Italy then and then it grow, then your sort of love of Italian football sort of grows from there, possibly?

I honestly think it's probably still like another few years before I'm really

properly engaged in football.

I think it's really interesting, like how we come to like these, these sort of things that become huge parts of our lives.

Even though the World Cup was a big deal and it was in Italy, my dad wasn't really a football fan.

My dad was really the only sort of,

well, no, his brother isn't that much of a football fan either, but a lot of the Italian family are football fans.

And he wasn't.

My dad liked tennis, but what he really liked, my dad, was being Italian, as ridiculous as that sounds, like he, you know, like there was a World Cup in Italy, so he was incredibly proud of the fact there was a World Cup in Italy and we could all talk about Italy and how great it is.

And

he

you know, getting behind the Italian national team was a big thing.

But once it was over, he was, again, not fussed about football.

So I didn't really pay attention to it again for a while.

And,

you know, this is sort of one of the things where like it's hard to talk about this in a way that isn't a bit odd because I am trans.

But like, I went to an all-boys school and I think that for me coming to football again, like in a more sort of concerted way, it's partly just because I went to school and like everyone liked football.

Like I wasn't that fussed about football when I first went to that school at eight years old.

Like I know I had like other things I was interested in before the age of eight.

And like, you know, in the breaks, everyone played football.

And it was like, okay, I wasn't very good at it, but like, I joined in.

And like, I think a lot of it for me like grows from there.

Like, you know, you play football because the other people who you're sort of stuck with for most of the day, that's what they want to do.

Most people in the UK of a certain age got into Italian football because of James Richardson and his shows on Channel 4 every Saturday and Sunday.

I remember it was quite the ritual in my house anyway.

My dad and I would would watch the Saturday morning Gazette and it was always tremendous fun and it was an insight into this world that we didn't know anything about.

And actually just you talking about Walter Zenga, my abiding memory of Walter Zenga's hair jewelry.

He always has a chain flapping around outside his shirt, which, you know, back in the days when footballers were still allowed to wear jewellery.

And he seemed to chew gum like nobody's business, more than Sam Allardyce, more than Cyrilic.

But I'm guessing, nikki that you were probably a bit too young to watch jimbo's show at the time were you i i definitely like watched it a bit like i probably not the very first episodes of it but i was definitely watching um i was definitely watching some football italia back then again it was sort of a thing that you could do with dad that was like a thing that he sort of even though he didn't care about the football like he was just sort of happy to like point to places and like talk about like oh you know italy basically um

I don't think it was,

yeah, I don't know what year Jimbo started with that, but no, we definitely had that on.

And that was definitely a thing I watched sometimes growing up.

I don't know if it was ever like such a fixed ritual.

And probably more, you know, what then becomes the sort of regular football watching at a certain point is Arsenal,

which was really, again, like slightly me being a follower, because my brother started sporting Arsenal and

I copied him.

Just before we go on to Arsenal, did...

Because your dad loved being Italian so much, like, did he, like, was your house quite Italian?

Like, I have this, I have this cliched image of you know you know nana's secret recipe huge plates of meatballs and all that kind of stuff i think there were some like real contradictions with my dad because like he was hugely proud of of being italian and wanted to talk about it a lot but also like it was really important to him that my brother and i spoke like properly like and you know i i'm aware that i have quite like a a bbc rp sort of way of talking and like i do think that was like a really important thing to my dad because i think he felt sometimes he was um discriminated against back in in you know his first time when he came to england especially probably before you know i was around like i think in when he was first there in the 20s i think being a sort of um an italian immigrant was was a thing for a while that got you sort of a certain look down on in in london and so there was that going on um

but i mean no there was lots of sort of you know we had um

big boxes of VHSs of Italian comedians and like things like that.

I don't know what make it like an Italian household.

My mum was English and did all the cooking, but she definitely cooked like Italian food.

Like she definitely had like learned the things that my dad wanted to eat and cooked that.

So I don't know.

It was definitely Italian in some ways.

I mean, like, there's some things that like are stupid that I think

are not like particularly profound, but you then realize that it's like isn't like something that's happening in most kids' households, which is my dad would come home from work every day and eat bread with olive oil.

Like he didn't, he'd have like always like, not every day but like a lot of the time it would be like sort of vaguely fresh bread and he'd have olive oil with it and it's stupid right that's not a big deal but like yeah most most english kids parents weren't doing that so like there were there were things for sure was he putting the balsamic vinegar in no no no no just salt and pepper the balsamic thing when like it became a trend in england like years later i was like what's this balsamic nonsense

but italy's so like that like there's like really like rules are very strict in italy but they're often like completely about like wherever specifically you grow up.

So like one place will say that's absolutely the way to do it, another place like you shouldn't do that at all.

You tweeted about junior gunners bus trips when we canvassed for questions.

Tell us about that junior gunner's bus trips.

At some point, as I say, my brother, I think, started having an interest in Arsenal before I did, really.

You know, I have

very vague memories of

things like

the winner Anfield.

And I think that's not even necessarily a memory.

It's something that sort of of got superimposed afterwards.

I don't know, like stuff like that.

But at a certain point, we did sort of start going to some games and we went to Arsenal games.

My dad would take us.

My dad, again, wasn't even that interested.

It was good like that, my dad.

I have to say, like, he wasn't interested in football.

There were other places he'd rather be, but he took us.

And at some point,

we did some away trips as well, which was a thing.

I don't even know if it's a thing now, because as like an adult, you're so much more aware of like how much harder this must be to organize in terms of like having like adults who are background checked approved and all these things but yeah like the junior gunners used to basically just run away trips where you'd go to you'd go to Highbury and you'd get on the bus and there'd be a few adults and a bus for the kids and they'd take you to an away game and they'd drop you off back there at the end of the day and when I look back on it like it just seems a bit mad because you'd have I don't know what it was, like 30 or 40 kids from probably,

I would guess, maybe like ages of like eight to to sort of mid-teen a years and

where you got sort of put in stadiums really varied like sometimes you'd be in with the away fans and sometimes you'd be in the the family enclosure and like i remember going to old trafford and we lost and we were just surrounded by united fans and like they weren't being nice to us because we were kids like they were they were like you know in our faces celebrating all the rest of it like i remember that i remember going to a middlesborough game where we won and then like on the got a journey as well like coach to middlesbrough i mean again as an adult you have a different perspective like like probably for our parents it was like great they're gone friendly of course yes out of the way on the whole weekend day um but yeah i remember like being on the on the bus back from middlesbrough and like one kid started i think we won three two like was doing the gesture of the school and out the window a car on the way back and then suddenly you had all these middlesbrough fans like leaning out the window swearing at us like doing winker gestures like

it was a really weird thing when I look back on it, but it was

fun.

Like, you know, as a kid, like, all of that stuff seems like very

silly.

But United go in particular, I do remember thinking, like, this is a bit uncomfortable.

Like, there's some very aggressive people around, and like, we're children or like early teenagers.

The junior used bus was slightly different.

I mean, I seem to remember, I never went to one without my dad, but going to Watford away, and just somebody, a kid behind me, eating too many flying saucers and just hurling up like the sugariest, sweetest moments on a coach to Watford.

I remember like one of the bus trips, like, because my mum would give us, like, I don't know, pack lunch or whatever.

And like, one time she'd given us these pepperamis.

They were like turkey pepperamis.

And I remember opening it.

Like, the second you opened it, you're like, this stinks.

You're on this bus full of people.

And you're like, oh, God, I'm that kid.

Who are your heroes then?

Footballing heroes?

Yeah.

Again, like, I think Arsenal players, like, it fits in the same mold as the Zenger thing to some extent, because it's like the ones who are most expressive and most colourful are the ones I love the most.

So like,

I remember being a really big fan of Paul Meerson.

And of course, Ian Wright, like Ian Wright was absolutely hero number one because he scored all the goals and he was

such like a brilliant character.

And like, I, I think, yeah, like Ian Wright was really one of those people who like, I remember at the time, like, I would get like

personally upset when people were critical of him.

And I remember like even after, like, when he was sort of making his first moves into doing TV stuff, and there was like some people who were being hostile to him.

And like, I would take it really personally about Ian Wright because he just to me was just this totally like pure joyful character and of course nobody's totally pure and joyful but it has been really so lovely seeing him develop into like a broadcaster who I still absolutely adore and who is um yeah I think one of the one of the best out there frankly yeah and a national treasure isn't he like no nobody can dislike Ian Wright I hated Ian Wright.

I hated him.

Yeah.

I don't know.

I thought he had,

I don't know, a cockiness and a swagger and a nasty streak that I think I'd admire now in players, but for some reason I just didn't particularly like Arsenal and he seemed to embody everything I didn't like about Arsenal.

And now I couldn't love Ian Wright more, but it's weird, weird just how our opinions completely differ.

Yeah, sort of fast forward and to sort of when you decided to work in football.

I mean, I know I've missed a huge chunk of, you know, from being a kid to being, to thinking about what you're going to do with

your life.

When was the moment where you thought this could be a profession for me?

Yeah, I do sometimes think like there's a certain amount of it was like falling in by accident, which is crazy when you think about how competitive an industry it is and how hard it is to do.

When I was at university, I had one sort of like, Again, it wasn't even as direct as like this is a step along the path, but like a thing that happened was I went to Warwick University and and I was there right as they were launching.

Um, well, it wasn't the launch, it's like the second year or something of the student university TV channel, which back then was, you know, calling it a channel was a stretch.

I don't know what they do now, but back then it was basically we'd sort of all make our little programs and put them together for ourselves.

And like, I think like once a week, they aired our stuff in the student union for like 20 minutes or something.

Um,

but I'd heard about it, and I went along to like the uh student

to like that they had had they had a day like at the beginning of this of the university year where they were like right we're going to elect our heads of departments

and I went along sort of out of curiosity as much I think I kind of wanted to meet people see if it was something I was interested to do and

they were like oh would you want to put your name down for head of department I was like I don't know like what have you got and it was like a head of news and like a head of comedy and then it was a head of sport I was like yeah sure put me down for head of sport and then like there was this like election in this I don't know it's like a Roman university and

they were sort of, people were coming up and giving these pitches about why they should be the head of news or the head of sport, head of documentaries, whatever.

It's all very like, you know, in that student way, like, it makes it sound very grand when it isn't.

Like it's, you know, it's

really tragic.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's for like 20, like, you know, gawky students in a, in a room together.

But anyway, when it got to the sport, like no one else stood up.

It was just me.

And so I still went up there and was like, I don't know what to say.

And so I made all sorts of absolutely impossible promises about like things I was going to do.

Oh, yeah, we're going to live broadcast like, you know, the top university sports teams, games to the, to the union, things that were just technically not within the realms of what we could do.

Anyway, so I got that and spent a year doing

sort of

terrible shows for Warwick University TV, but had a lot of fun doing it, learned some stuff about.

how all that stuff works, which is really interesting.

Then kind of left it for a while because I finished university and I

had like a really interesting time in working in TV.

So I came out of university and my sort of first career job, there's a winding part up even to this, but my first career job is

working as a

researcher and runner for a TV documentary company and on a big word series that was for BBC called Border Dash and Piffle.

It's actually a really fun thing to work on.

Had Victoria Corrin hosting it who in her sort of peak poker playing days, remember there was always like a negotiation of like, can we start a filming day at like 10 a.m and she'd be like oh it's so early like that was these sort of i did that and um

during that was hankering a bit for like something more urgent because we spent like nine months making this tv series which was fun but it was it was slow slow going

I was thinking I could skip a step and I've realized by skipping a step I've made this more confusing

because basically right so because I had sort of been interested in doing that TV work right after university I took a one-year working visa in Canada because you could I found out from someone at university that, like, you were entitled to, as a British citizen, like just have a one-year working visa in Canada up to the age of 30.

I thought, I want to do that.

That sounds interesting.

So, I had done that, gone and worked in, you know, nothing too serious.

I was working in a kitchen most of the time.

I was over there.

Right before doing that, I'd done some work experience in TV.

And while I was doing work experience in TV, I had met someone who was

able to get me a week's work experience at the Guardian Sports Desk as well.

So, I'd had one week's work experience at the Guardian Sports Desk.

Was it Barry?

No, it wasn't Barry, no.

So I got one week's work experience right before

going away on that sort of year.

Well, it didn't end up being a year because I got this job off to come back for the Bolshevik and Peerful series, but six months, whatever I was in Canada.

And I had enjoyed it and I'd stayed in touch, basically, with the Guardian Sports Desk.

So when I came back and I was doing my work for the TV documentary series, I,

you know, was a researcher on it.

They paid you.

peanuts.

It was really hard to live in London and afford to live in London.

And I got back in touch with the Guardian Sports Desk and I got during that time I did some night shifts.

I don't know if Baz will remember this role, but there was like a night uploader and night editor role.

And yeah, you'd come in and you would, because that was the Guardian was like ahead of everyone in putting all of the newspaper content online.

The job was literally like newspaper content drops into an online management system.

You need to put it on the website and make the pages look nice.

So I did have my sort of foot in the door a bit at the Guardian.

To me, it didn't feel at the time like journalism work.

Like it felt like it was just like an extra sort of like,

you know, temping job to make some extra money so I could afford to be in London.

Yeah, that relationship definitely then helps me because at the end of my time on the TV documentary series, I decided I didn't want to go into journalism.

I went and did a 20-week NCTJ journalism course at Highbury College in Portsmouth.

And

During that time, I got some more work experience at The Guardian because they wanted you to do that as part of the course.

And at the end of that course,

right as we were doing the exams, actually, it was a 2006 World Cup and The the Guardian needed more hands-on deck in the office during the day.

So I went from having done the night shifts before doing some day shifts on the Guardian online sports desk, which again, as Baz knows, is completely separate to

the newspaper desk at that time.

There was the online desk and the newspaper desk.

And yeah, it all kind of went from there, like right after

the World Cup, a really a lovely journalist, someone I think was a brilliant journalist, but obviously decided to go and take a different path.

Georgie left the Guardian sports desk and there was an open spot.

And for a a while, they had us doing shift work.

It was me and a few others.

And at a certain point, I got offered a press association traineeship.

And I said to the Guardian, I'm going to take this unless you give me a job.

And

incredibly, they did give me a job.

So I stayed.

Which was after, as Peter writes, you did work experience at the Leamington Courier, which included a feature about what was on your MP3 player.

Do you remember what was on your MP3 player?

You were doing work experience at the Lemmington Courier.

Do you remember what an MP3 player is?

All right, that'll do for part one.

We'll be back in a tick.

Hi, Pod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here, too.

Hello.

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remarkable a brand name and an adjective man yeah it's their most portable paper tablet yet it holds all your notes to-dos and documents but it's smaller than a paperback and an incredible 0.26 inches thin so it slips easily into a bag or jacket pocket perfect for working professionals whose jobs take them out of the office like maybe a football journalist barry although not like you

a proper football journalist man exactly too much technology draws us in and shuts the world out this paper tablet doesn't It'll never beat or buzz to try and grab your attention, so you can devote your focus to what or who is in front of you.

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Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

Joseph says, no questions.

Just want to say, as an American listener, I've always enjoyed Nikki's wisdom and gentle humor.

I don't know how you are with compliments, Nikki.

I don't get many, so I find it much easier to take the insults.

I don't know if her personal life will be touched on, but having just recently learned more about her, please pass on my admiration for her courage and grace.

Pylon says, I'm pretty sure it's out of bounds, but I'd love to hear about her transition.

I kind of feel she might not want to talk about this unless I'm wrong.

But I was wondering if everything went well for her, especially in Italy.

Look, we talked about this very briefly on

the pod on the LGBTQ special we did a few months ago.

um and obviously we've talked about it before you're you're sort of happy to talk about this and aware that if me or barry ask something stupid or get our language wrong or whatever you will instantly pull us up on it yeah no i i think it's it's probably like pretty unrealistic to try and have any sort of discussion of my life that doesn't bring it in because i mean as i already mentioned i went got sent to an all-boys school when i was a kid which you know now feels like something really odd but yeah it's hard not to talk about it so um you know within reason i'm open to talking about it.

So, so, like,

what age do you feel different?

Is that a silly question?

Yeah, I don't know.

It's, it's, I don't know if it's a silly question.

It's a complicated question because I think like, um,

people

in all sorts of things in their like self-understanding

arrive at like mature understandings of themselves at different ages.

You know, some people have a very sort of clear idea of who they are when they're very little.

And some people don't.

I'm not just talking about gender here, you know, like I've heard people talk about this with reference to things they wanted to do in their life, to like, you know, their interests, to like the things that become there, that shape their career, to their sexualities as well.

Like some people talk about knowing very clearly that they fancy people of certain genders when they're very little and some people don't.

And I think all those things are like,

yeah, like things that you can come to with different levels of clarity.

And I think like as a kid, I can sort of talk about all sorts of things that

seemed obvious to me.

Like it seemed obvious to me that it would be better if I was a girl, but like it didn't seem like a real thing to like

do.

Like it didn't seem like that was an option and that was just, you know, one of those things that you,

that you had were all shaped by like the course of events around us as well.

And, you know, I think I was probably wrestling with it much more for a little while as I sort of

approached

the teenage years.

And then something quite big happened in my life, which was that my father passed away.

And I think like

there was a real moment for me of like you mustn't cause a fuss now like you know like things are quite hard at the moment and like now's a good time to like just get on with everything and i think we probably all did that as a family sure i didn't talk too much my rest of my family but i think we all sort of

had this sort of mindset for a long time of you know if nobody's dying then everything's all right and um yeah i think it's it's sort of a juncture that who knows if you go back in time how things might have worked out differently but um

you sort of go down a different path and then after that it becomes something that you sort of swallow for a long time and and other things happen in life and you um

I don't know I think you can get to a point with certain sort of things and and

I don't know if I like the word denial because denial is like sort of implies you're doing something really consciously to me and I think it's it's not always as conscious as that but I think you do sort of um

and again I think it doesn't this doesn't just refer to gender I I think people do this with all sorts of parts of themselves, but you sort of tell yourself that something isn't important.

You tell yourself that,

yeah, this isn't great, but I can deal with it.

This isn't great, but I can deal with it.

And

some of those things over time just creep up on you and they become more and more a thing that you realize you have to deal with.

And yeah, you know, I

think there's a big part that goes on behind the scenes that

even sort of though this is no longer talking about childhood, this is adulthood and it's much more recent.

I think now when I try and think back clearly about like the process of how you get to where you are today, some of it seems sort of

hard to even sort of recall with clarity because there was so much emotion going on.

There was so much difficult stuff going on.

But I went to therapy for a long time.

Like I went to therapy for a long time and I started talking about these things I hadn't talked about.

And

at the beginning of that therapy, I still was telling myself that we wouldn't end up where we are today because it seemed like something impossible and horrible and like it was just going to destroy my life and everyone was going to hate me and that was going to be the end of everything.

And,

you know, I'm quite glad that has worked out not to be the case.

There was some horrible difficult bits along the way, but

I feel like I've sort of arrived at the other side of it quite happy.

Over time, does it become more all-consuming?

Like, because when we were talking about these things, oh, I went to Canada for six months.

I was working on this documentary.

And it's sort of hard enough to do all these things and, you know, working weekend shifts.

Was this at the front of your mind for all of that?

Or is there days where you just don't sort of think about it?

I think there's plenty of days when you don't think about it because there's, of course, there's days when you don't think about your gender, like you're busy.

And I think one thing I've always been very good at is keeping myself busy.

You know, Canada is an interesting chapter again, because I could point to some very clear memories that happened at the time.

Like, you know,

before I went to Canada, I think honestly, in my entire life,

very possibly I'd met someone without knowing, but I'd never known the trans person.

And so like the only exposure I'd had to trans people was in,

God, I remember reading one newspaper article about a guy in England

who was sort of a trans guy.

And I remember

trans women on Jerry Springer.

That's where I remember seeing trans people when I was growing up.

And then I went to Canada and I,

yeah,

met some trans people very briefly.

Like they still weren't sort of people who I sort of saw regularly.

They were were just the people who I sort of, whose paths I crossed with briefly.

There were moments in that period when it was like,

you know, maybe you should try and actually like find those people and talk to them about these things and do it.

But

again, like, you know, some things sort of,

I don't know, it's...

It's hard again to explain with clarity what I'm thinking when I'm 20 years old because I'm not 20 years old anymore.

It's a long time ago.

But some things just seem so sort of impossible that you just sort of tell yourself that's impossible.

And so, you know, you can feel sad about it.

And there was lots of sort of times when there was sadness about it or like, you know,

angst of some kind about it, but you don't necessarily take the next logical step, which is that I can do something about this.

And again, I do think like I was very good and have always been good at being busy.

Like I'm very good at like, oh, I'm going to go to work, do the work I'm going to do.

Oh, I'm going to go and keep myself socially busy and go and like have friendships.

And

in some ways, when you talk about doing those two jobs, when I was starting out, that's like the prime example of just be busy, like just keep working.

And, you know, that's a good thing to do.

And work has always been one thing that I think I

feel like nobody can tell you off for.

Like if you're doing work, then you're providing a good value to the world.

And that's a good thing to be doing.

So, so then

that moment where, oh my, it's probably not a moment, is it, where you actually can, you, you realize or you decide you can do something about this.

Is that a moment of liberation or is that an incredibly stressful

time

or both?

I think it's too simple to call it a moment.

You know, I had a coming out moment to my

then spouse.

I was married.

I think that's been talked about on the podcast before as well,

who's someone who is an incredible person who I'm still very lucky to have in my life.

But I,

you know, that was the first person I ever said anything to about it in the world.

And it was not a liberating, fun moment.

It was, it was a panic attack and a breakdown.

Yeah, that was sort of an incredibly difficult moment that

was sort of a first moment, if you want to talk about moments.

And then I suppose there's, there's moments along the way after that that are different levels of difficult and

joyful.

Like there is joyfulness that comes, but it's not.

it's not a moment for me.

Like it's there's sort of steps that sort of you get to, but I think especially like probably because of that relationship which was a great relationship and is you know is still a great relationship just a different kind of relationship um

i think that sort of unpicking that became its own story but even before that again like it wasn't like i sort of had this moment of like

clarity, like I'm going to transition.

I had this moment of, I need to talk about this.

Like I can't, you know, continue forever not talking about something that is in my head so often.

And, you know, that's where it starts.

And so, yeah, where the sort of moment is, I don't know, after that, like everything sort of feels like it's more of a process that unfolds.

There was this time where you'd come out privately, but you were working with us and other people

and you hadn't.

And that must have been a very strange time.

Yeah, it was an incredibly awkward time, to be honest.

Because again, but then, you know, coming out comes in different forms.

You know, the coming out to my ex is,

I need to talk about about this.

Coming out to, you know, close friends and family is, at first, that relationship is breaking down because everyone knows you in your relationships, don't they?

And I need to explain to you why that's happening.

And that's still not the point of me saying, and I'm transitioning.

That's the point of me saying, like, there's some hard stuff I'm going through.

And

yeah, then there is this process, as you say, of actually sort of

starting to take steps towards what will eventually become,

you know, it's a medical process as well.

In my case, it isn't for everybody.

Everybody has their own journey.

And

yeah, as you're sort of starting to make those steps, there's sort of this growing awareness that you are going to have to go, because you do a public-facing job, you're going to have to go public, which

was.

Yeah, that was a really stressful, hard time because you're sort of constantly worried about, is someone going to work this out before I say something?

And also, like, when is the right time to say something?

And I had some help from someone

really wonderful who actually, again, my ex introduced me to, who

deals with crisis communications for companies, who like talked to me about like how you, how you

can approach these, these things differently.

And, you know, she said to me, like, you know, you can,

there are really like two big options, which is that you either let the information just leak out slowly and you don't have this sort of big sort of moment with everyone focusing on you.

And there's some advantages to that and disadvantage to that.

Or you

take ownership of it, and the advantage of that is you take ownership of it.

There's no gossip, there's no one siblings.

And so, there was a decision point about doing that, which obviously is when I write my article and do a video.

But, like, there's a build-up period in which, yeah, you're

worried about how you're being perceived.

Obviously, I was growing my hair out, which of course people are going to joke about.

Like, of course, they are.

Like, that's like a normal thing to do.

I cringe at me and Barry, like, oh, yeah, you just joking about you having a sort of midlife crisis or just something i can't remember like you'd come you know on the pod and i just think oh you know my toes still curl when i think back to

i think you'd moved to brighton you're growing your hair long and you were talking about going clubbing and i we it was a running joke that you know your midlife crisis and then when when you made your big announcement i was just oh christ i mean it was so much to deal with yeah You know, as a standalone thing, but then obviously being completely self-centered, I immediately thought, oh, Christ, I'm going to look really bad here.

I honestly think, like,

you know, I think the majority of people who I work with have been brilliant.

I think this podcast has been brilliant.

I really do.

Like, and that goes to you as well, Baz.

Like, you don't need to feel like guilty about things you said when like, you know, you didn't know.

Like, this is another thing that you should feel bad about.

there's only a very small minority of people within journalism who at least to my face um i'm sure things have been said about me when i haven't been present um have been have been uh unpleasant and uh

and yeah you know i i get it like i have friends like if your friend suddenly starts acting differently you're gonna say something about it and if you're a real friend probably like your natural mode is to joke about it rather than to say something earnest because

Well, I mean, you said earlier, Max, I did live in America for two years.

They're often a bit more earnest in America, but in England, generally, when someone, you know, wants to be sincere with a friend, they make a joke, don't they?

I remember really overthinking, like, when you were first coming in,

like wanting to be sort of over supportive, going, you know, obviously, like, you'd come on the pod, I'd just say, all right.

And when you came, I was like, oh, do I.

No, I should give you a hug.

And then I, I just, I distinctly remember going, you sort of say, oh, we're hugging, are we?

And we're going, oh, shit, maybe I shouldn't have.

Oh, fuck.

I was being awkward, right?

Like, I was awkward at that moment.

I'm sort of interacting with, with all of you guys in a different way in the first time.

So like it's awkward for everyone.

Like, and I'm there sort of feeling very guilty for making people feel awkward.

Like it's never been a thing I want in my life to make other people feel awkward.

I mean, God, that's a whole different topic, frankly, because sometimes

when you read too many news headlines, it's like existing as being trans can be made to feel like it's something that's putting everyone else out, which is, you know, not why anyone transitions.

Yeah.

I think we muddled through pretty well.

Honestly, I think we muddled through pretty well.

To be fair to Bears, you did that video and his tweet, first tweet was, I thought it was big news.

I thought you were joining the athletic.

It was really, really funny.

Yes, yeah.

That video,

like, it knocked me sideways.

I had a little heads up,

I think, an hour before it was posted, and it completely knocked me sideways.

It's probably the most shocking news I've ever heard.

in my entire life.

And I was really worried on your behalf that people will be unpleasant to you.

Or I'm just wondering, has that happened?

Like, say, on trains or just walking down the street or going about your business, whatever.

I think there's like a really sort of

interesting

when you go through the looking glass, which sometimes it feels like I have,

you, you do

get this very odd experience of people treating you differently.

And it becomes hard in lots of situations to know when like you're being treated differently because you're being perceived as one thing or another.

Like, is this because I'm transgender?

Is this because I'm a woman?

Like, these things are unclear.

Like, when I talk about in our work, like, if someone's posting under a YouTube video, as has happened or

back in the kitchen or whatever, oh, that's probably just straightforward sexism.

If

someone is

lamenting, you know, when did Sky Sports get so woke?

Is that because I'm trans or is it because I'm a woman?

It could be either because I'm on there with another woman, you know, Mina Rizuki.

And like, like, that could be either, right?

Like, you know, that's, that's, um, that stuff is, is blurry.

I think, um,

you know, probably more earlier in my transition, there was some overtly transphobic stuff that went on.

Like, and yes, I've been shouted out in the street.

Um, and uh,

yeah, I've had sort of some some up-close personal abuse from people who I've never met in my life, which is, is not a pleasant thing to happen.

And yeah, then there's also the other part of it, which is things that every woman journalist who covers sport deals with.

There's been situations like even coming back from the

Euros final, going back to my hotel in London.

There was a guy sort of following me and saying sexual stuff and then, you know, calling me a frigid bitch and all the rest of it.

And like me having to sort of scurry by marry the bone to like a random couple I saw walking just so I was walking with someone.

Yeah, like

it definitely like it is less safe in society in lots of situations to not be perceived as a man.

Like, that is, that is a thing.

And again, like, the times when it's about being trans

can be horrible and the times when it's about being a woman can be horrible.

And they're both sort of present and

unfortunate side effects, I suppose, to getting to live in a more authentic way.

There's probably not an exact answer to this question either, I guess.

But, you know, and this pod is about you and your career and your life.

It's not about trans rights, right?

Whether in sport or anything else.

But I wonder, as you know, do you become more comfortable in your own skin as every year goes by?

But does it get harder to be a,

is it becoming harder to be trans or easier to be trans?

I mean, the headlines would,

you know, would perhaps mean it's harder.

I don't know.

Yeah,

I don't know how to answer that question.

I think there's sort of,

in some areas, greater acceptance and in some areas, quite plainly, sort of greater hostility.

I mean, right now we're the political football, like I'm sure, you know, well, not I'm sure, like it clearly migrations to this for lots of people as well.

But right now, like the number one culture wars topic in this country and in America is trans people.

And,

you know, every British newspaper, including the one that publishes this podcast, has carried some articles that I personally think have been incredibly unhelpful.

And I think there's this sort of constant linking of trans people with crimes committed by a sort of tiny minority that is being re-imprinted over and over again as what people think about when they think about trans people.

In the same way as after terrorist attacks, the media will just impress on the population that this is a Muslim problem, for instance, as was certainly the case for a long time in Britain.

Now this is a trans problem and, you know, most people in the world don't care about it, but enough do that you do get nasty scary people out there who are going to do nasty scary things and and and attack you for it so it it is a bad time in that regard and

you know this this comes to things that i think um a lot of trans people do and you know trans is a a big umbrella and and different people experience their lives in different ways but as someone who i suppose has transitioned in quite a binary way there are definitely times when you just sort of hope for your safety that you're not being perceived as trans because it's just easier to just be perceived as not that because of those risks.

But speaking sort of just personally, which is all I can do,

I've tried in most things to just get on with it and do what I've always done in my life, which is just to be myself and let people take me as they take me.

You do have to weigh that up in some situations against personal safety.

And as I talked about at the time, there's, for instance, the Qatar World Cup.

It was simplified for me because Italy didn't qualify, but could I have gone and been safe?

I don't know the answer to that.

And that stuff's pretty grim.

Philippa York does punditry on major cycling events.

And a couple of weeks ago, I think it might have been during the Giro to Talia,

her co-commentator referred to her successes when she was cycling under the name Robert Miller.

a very very successful Scottish cyclist.

And I did, I noticed somebody on, a couple of people on Twitter got very

offended on her behalf because he had dead named her, you know, used her Robert Miller name that she used to go by.

And she went on Twitter and said, look, I have no problem with this.

I was a cyclist.

I rode under the name of Robert Miller.

Now I'm Philippa York.

And these people continued to be offended on her behalf.

And I just found it really...

weird, their attitude, and very unhelpful as well.

I'm not sure what kind of point I'm trying to to make here, but maybe it's just the toxicity of this ongoing debate.

But she had made it clear, I have no problem with my co-commentator referring to my successes as Robert Miller

and using that name.

I've made it clear I have no problem with it.

And they still say, no, no, he's bang out of order.

He shouldn't have done that.

He's offending all trans people.

I think that's a complicated dynamic.

I didn't follow this story, so I don't know anything about it.

And I think that everyone has the right to sort of

experience things like their old names as they do.

And if that's how Philippa feels, then I would certainly say, well, that's Philippa's thing to worry about, not mine.

But I also understand that for a lot of trans people, it is something that they prefer not to have talked about.

I think it's harder for those of us who were public figures before transitioning because you kind of can't as easily sort of just sort of pretend that wasn't a thing.

So you experience that differently.

But

I understand everyone's emotion in that.

And I do think if there was one thing that I think would benefit this whole discourse, honestly, it would be the tomorrow, someone just deleting Twitter from the world, because I think it was already an unhelpful place in many of these discussions.

And I think that since a particularly unhelpful, willfully unhelpful person took charge, it's become an even more unhelpful place for these discussions.

Nikki, thanks so much.

I mean, I don't know if it means a lot, but I just don't honestly just see you as someone who's good on the pod.

You know, that's it.

And like, and that's sort of how it should be, right?

I think that's, that's all you, that's all you really want.

That's all you really want is just to be able to add, right?

It's all I wanted.

I can't speak for anyone else.

All I wanted was to be able to get on with life and be myself.

And I think that this podcast has always allowed me that.

All right.

Well, we'll do more in just a second.

Hi, pod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here, too.

Hello.

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Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly Life and Time Especially with Nikki Bandini.

Sam says, I know Nikki is a guno like myself.

Does she have an Italian team?

I've always assumed it was inter.

So the real answer now is that I don't.

And

I think like if you

spent a season even in my shoes covering the league and

experiencing that way, you do experience

these things differently.

And I think that

really, like, what you want as a journalist is interesting stories.

And that's the number one thing.

But if you'd asked me when I was, I don't know, 15 or 16, because all my cousins sport inter, I definitely had a spot for inter

and if you have paid attention to the podcast long enough, you'll know that I even had some cousins

not so long ago who were on the bookstair.

So yes, I have some connections to inter that are probably a bit different.

But,

you know, the best way I can explain it is what I've always sort of said, which is

in my dream world where Arsenal winning the league every season, I wouldn't get bored of that.

Whereas if Inter won the league, I would be happy for my cousins, but I kind of would be more hoping the next season they didn't win it again because it's more interesting to write about.

It's more interesting to write about if you've got different teams than if you've got competition.

Football changes when you work in it, doesn't it?

In

every way, I think.

Tony says, Why are there such differences between Italian and English football?

Do you think these differences will diminish over time as we import, export export more players and managers?

It's way too big a question because

it goes to like how you're brought up, like how you experience football, like everything like in your national culture affects how your football is different, which is why every country has its own sort of football identity and different things.

The sort of big picture of is it different?

Yes, it is.

I mean, you know, Italian football has got a different mindset that I think comes to cultural things.

And do managers go crossing countries change things?

Yes, they definitely do, right?

Like there's so much sort of cross sort sort of cultural learning that goes on at the highest level of football anyway.

And I think Italy in some ways was ahead of the curve on this anyway, because there's a manager school of Coverciano where managers are all writing their thesis every time they graduate and

you've got this sort of desire to, in some ways, make it academic.

I think there's always been some of that.

But I think the countries never completely lose what they are because still the majority of managers, managers, the majority of sort of players in the pyramid, maybe not in the top divisions,

are still growing up in Italy with an Italian outlook on the world.

You've interviewed some

pretty big Italian stars, Totti, Buffon, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Do you have a most memorable one or memorable moment covering Italian football?

I mean, some of the most memorable moments covering Italian football, honestly, this season, because a Milan Derby in the semifinal of the Champions League is something that you don't, you know, you don't get to experience um so getting to cover those both for stan was something really special um

interview is without question gigi buffon i've interviewed him a few times but there was one in particular um was my i know it was my second sit-down with him and uh i was doing it for 8x8 magazine and they had a photographer roger nev who's um this brilliant um

Dutch photographer who I think does a lot of fashion, I don't think I know, he does a lot of fashion shooting as well.

And he's got this way of sort of disarming footballers.

Like he, he, he

manages to sort of get them to lean into the silliness of like these stupid photo shoots that he does.

And, and I think he sort of helped me on that occasion to really sort of bring out the playfulness and the fun in Buffon.

And we ended up having this sort of huge conversation that went on for a really long time.

And I'd come in with, as I always do, I never come with like a fixed list of questions, but I come with like topics I think I'm going to talk about.

And I had a big list of topics I wanted to talk about.

And instead, we got into this like whole conversation about the meaning of life.

And I was just like, I don't know, like, it was one of those really like cool moments where you're like, I'm sat here with Gigi Buffon, who at a certain point before I was doing this, was this sort of mythic figure.

And he's talking to me about what he thinks the meaning of life is.

And yeah, it was, it was a really cool conversation.

So did you and did you and Gigi Buffon work out the meaning of life?

Do you know what's awful as I'm saying that?

I'm the only thing I can't remember exactly what he said.

So you'll have to go back and double check the internet.

I mean, he talked, he talked about um

giant,

I'm gonna say go find it because I'll say I'll butcher it and it won't be as good as he said it.

So, yeah, go and find it.

Maybe I'll see if I can find a link and because I'm pretty sure it's online and get Joel to post it in the in the notes.

But um, that was that was a really fun interview.

Um, um, I've been really lucky to have some really, really fun interviews in my career, and uh, but that's that definitely stands out.

I want to touch on the states a bit.

I mean, our timeline's all over the place, but when did you go?

And was that sort of NFL based, or did your love of nfl come from being over there no my nfl enthusiasm is another thing that goes back to to friends in school like you know something that there's channel four and nick luckhurst and gary imblack no it was a bit late for that it was sky sports um sky sports like i first got into the nfl because we had a family holiday to america where we met some um

family friends of my parents and uh had the game explained to me and was like, oh, this is better than I thought it would be.

This is less sort of boring and inscrutable than I thought it was.

And then I came back and talked to someone at school who was like, oh, I love the NFL.

And so we sort of developed an interest from there.

Going to America in 2012 was actually like nothing to do with me.

My ex got a Fulbright scholarship to study in the States.

And I was like, yeah, go on.

Let's do it.

Why not?

Like, how many times did he get this random excuse to go and live in a different country?

And Missouri of all places.

And

yeah, that was a really cool experience.

And when you talk about interviews, I ended up writing the autobiography of Jimmy Nielsen, who was a player for Sporting Kansas City at the time.

And that's a series of interviews, but that's probably even

more enjoyable interviews because that was really someone who, like, when you're doing an autobiography, like, they want to let you get under their skin and understand everything.

That was a real privilege and a fun thing to do.

Owen says, is there the same sort of snobbery or stigma around British people covering the NFL as there is here when we hear an American covering football?

I think there's like shock when like you talk to Americans and they're like, oh, you actually understand.

But to be honest with you, like, I mean, this is another of those things that like, when I talk about the through the looking glass moments, you know, I covered the last Super Bowl for The Guardian.

And like, I had

more than one cab driver, like, when I was telling that I was there for the Super Bowl, being like, oh, but do you like, do you really like it?

Like, do you, are you really into it?

Like, do you actually understand it?

I'm like, that's, you know, that's sexism, basically.

But like, you know,

it's definitely like combined with the English accent, I'm sure, like,

um, part of it.

Um, I actually sort of look back on that and think it was such a sort of odd thing.

Cause for a while, I was, I was doing a regular column for the NFL's UK office on the St.

Louis Rams, because at the time they were the London team that came over every year.

And I remember like having this conversation with

the reporters there, like the regular beat reporters, like some, a couple of them in like the the press room at the Rams training facility.

And at the time, I hadn't covered a single NFL regular season game, but I covered several Super Bowls.

And like I said, this, and like all these guys who cover the sport every like week, who've never got to cover a Super Bowl, are like, excuse me, like, what?

So, yeah, like, it's massive glory hunting.

Yeah, exactly.

Why in for the big games?

Um, Serbo says, uh, favorite city in Italy and why?

Non-footballing reasons.

Can you get the best pasta there, or is that somewhere else?

Well, the good news is I am going to say the place that I think you get the best pasta, which is Bologna.

Um, the reason is that I'm biased because my dad's hometown is like an hour away in the hills.

But so you'd always go through Bologna and

I get together to go there a lot.

But I think Bologna is like, I put it right at the top of places I'd tell people who have got like a bit of interest in Italian football to have a city break because you go to Bologna,

best pastor in the country, in my opinion.

Obviously, like the reason we call...

it's spaghetti bolognese in england is actually ragu from bologna originally it's something a bit different over there but it's it's amazing.

But they also have Capella di Mbrodo, there's all sorts.

And I really like it as well just to visit because it's not too big, Bologna.

You can like station yourself quite centrally and just walk everywhere.

It's really pretty.

You've got the little towers, like all of it is, all of it is gorgeous.

And the football stadium, again, with a little tower, is, I think, one of the...

the sort of understated lovely places to go.

Obviously, go to San Cedo, like whatever you do, go to San Cedo while it's still in use.

But

renato dellara is also a lovely stadium to go to henrik says what is sticky's desert island italian meal and is it from a specific restaurant or homemade i mean i i i think probably like if i was choosing one meal it would be yeah i was gonna say my mum's lasagna but i can make it too now so like it's my lasagna like i i think lasagna like done well is is really really good um but it's a desert island so it's quite hot do you want something that's stodgy do you want lasagna or a desert island you don't really want you know because i've yeah it's it's shouldn't the question be your deal meal rather than your

desert?

Because you've got to get sick of it if you're having a desert

day in a depot meal, is your own lasagna, which means you get to cook, so you're like, you could really, you could slow cook the ragu and give yourself a bit more time and shank the prison guards with the knife.

That's absolutely try to escape.

Finally, Matt says, favorite Italian expression?

I think the one that's in my head is

Monce Pi tripapergatti, which is like, there's there's no more tripe for the cats, which is such a weird, like, ridiculous like phrase, like, but because tripe for the cats, but like, you know, it's sort of it's, I guess, when you're in a you're in a more lavish state when there's tripe for the cats, and when there's not, um,

things have changed.

Um, Nikki, thanks so much for doing this.

Um, and uh,

yeah, thanks, appreciate it, it was great.

No problems, anytime.

Thanks, Baz.

Thank you.

Football Weekly is produced by Joel Grove.

Our executive producer is Danielle Stevens.

This is The Guardian.