‘The worst thing about Gazza? Being on the receiving end of some of his practical jokes! I rarely was, he knew better, but some were quite disgusting…’ Gary Lineker on the pros and cons of being Paul Gascoigne’s team-mate

Gary Lineker congratulates Paul Gascoigne after a Tottenham goal against Hartlepool in 1990.

You’d struggle to find two more contrasting personalities on a football pitch - and in a dressing room - than Gary Lineker and Paul Gascoigne.

The former was one of the best poachers that English football has ever produced and his straight-laced ways on the pitch, where he played more than 650 games without ever being shown a yellow card, were matched by his professionalism off the pitch.

Then you have Gazza, who has never been described as a consummate professional, but rather a freewheeling yet flawed genius. But that didn’t stop the pair from chalking up a friendship that remains to this day.

Gary Lineker on the best - and worst - aspects of being Gazza's team-mate

Paul Gascoigne during the 1990 World Cup (Image credit: Getty Images)

Lineker and Gascoigne first played alongside each other for England against Saudi Arabia in 1989 when the latter won his second Three Lions cap and would go to play as team-mates 86 more times before their final appearance together for Tottenham in the 1990/91 FA Cup Final, when a fired-up Gazza infamously ruptured his cruciate ligaments following an over-zealous foul on Nottingham Forest’s Gary Charles.

Few players got to experience the Gazza rollercoaster like Lineker did, with the Match of the Day presenter recalling to FourFourTwo the best thing about being his team-mate.

Gary Lineker during the 1990 World Cup semi-final against West Germany

“Laughing at his jokes, you’d constantly be chuckling,” he recalls.

“Sometimes he’d drive you mad, though, particularly playing with him because he’d never pass you the ball unless he was knackered.

“In fact, he was so good that the only time you’d get it was if he knew you had no choice but to give it back! He was lots of fun.”

But what about the other side - what was the worst thing about being team-mates with such an unpredictable personality, a man who once drove past a zoo on the way to training, borrowed an ostrich and let it loose on his team-mates with his No.8 shirt on?

Paul Gascoigne during his time at Tottenham (Image credit: Getty)

“Being on the receiving end of some of his practical jokes!,” Lineker - who was ranked at No.10 in FourFourTwo’s list of the greatest ever England players, three placed behind Gazza - adds before declining to indulge in any examples.

“I rarely was, he knew better, but some were quite disgusting…”