Gary Lineker and Alan Shearer used their first live BBC TV appearance since the furore around Match of the Day to address their absence and disruption to BBC sports programme last weekend.
Lineker was taken off air by the broadcaster after comparing the use of language used around the UK Government's controversial immigration policy to 1930s Germany, with the BBC deeming he had breached their rules on impartiality. He was removed from presenting duties for last Saturday night's MOTD, a decision which was met with a huge amount of support for Lineker.
Pundits Alan Shearer and Ian Wright refused to take their usual places on the programme in a show of solidarity, while a host of BBC sports programming was disrupted in protest.
Lineker has since been reinstated to BBC duties.
On Saturday evening, on the BBC's coverage of Manchester City v Burnley in the FA Cup, the duo touched on the elephant in the room in the match build-up.
"Alan, it's great to be here," Lineker said.
Shearer then said: "Yeah, it's good. I just needed to clear up and wanted to say how upset we were, all the audiences who missed out on last weekend, it was a really difficult situation for everyone concerned, and through no fault of their own some really great people in TV and in radio were put in an impossible situation and that wasn't fair. So, it's good to get back to some sort of normality and be talking about football again."
"Absolutely echo those sentiments," Lineker added.
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