By
James Millbank
Last updated at 2:43 PM on 27th November 2011
Discraced football pundit Andy Gray is selling his country home for almost £4 million, ten months after being sacked from Sky Sports.
The former player, who lost his £1.7 million-a-year job at Sky for making a series of sexist comments, put the property, which sits in 19 acres, on the market earlier this week.
Gray, 55, is believed to be ‘downsizing’ as he is earning far less in his job as a radio presenter on Talksport.
Gray’s four-bedroom home has a heated swimming pool, stable block, all-weather tennis court and a two-storey leisure area with a snooker room, office and gym. The estate, which is set in leafy countryside but close to the M40 and less than 30 minutes from the centre of Birmingham, also has a host of outbuildings, an ornamental garden, a lake, Elizabethan knot garden and a separate three-bedroom cottage in the grounds.
Up for grabs: The country home that Gray is selling for £4million
There is a hot tub, staff rest room, a sunken Italian garden with ‘water rill’, some pasture land and even a golf putting green.
A source close to Gray told The Mail on Sunday: ‘I’m not surprised he’s selling the place. It was costing him a fortune and he has spent tens of thousands on the place. He is mortgaged up to the hilt and he is not on the kind of salary that he was at Sky Sports any more.
‘He was on a huge deal with them, they gave him a great package. Talksport pay much less.’
Gray bought the Grade II-listed property for £2,100,000 six years ago. Features include oak beams, fireplaces and raised flagstone hearths.
But he has spent a considerable amount modernising it, and on interior design. Modern touches include a huge flatscreen television in the lounge and another in the wall of a mosaic-tiled bathroom, along with a mock marble Grecian frieze.
The games room, in a two-storey ‘cathedral ceiling’ annexe, houses a blue-clothed, full-size snooker table, a jukebox and a free-standing classic arcade machine.
Gray bought the Grade II-listed property
for £2,100,000 six years ago. Features include oak beams, fireplaces
and raised flagstone hearths.
Gray, who is twice married and has five children, had a long-term relationship with former gymnast Suzanne Dando but now lives with his fiancee Rachel Lewis, a former model.
His home is on the market for £3,900,000. An employee at the estate agency dealing with the sale said yesterday: ‘The owner is keen to sell and is relocating in the area with his partner.’
The former Scotland and Everton centre forward was suspended by Sky Sports, along with co-presenter Richard Keys, in January after The Mail on Sunday published indiscreet comments he made about female assistant referee Sian Massey, saying she wouldn’t know the offside rule.
Then older footage came to light in which he was heard directing a lewd comment at fellow presenter Charlotte Jackson, and Sky sacked him for ‘unacceptable behaviour’.
Shamed: Andy Gray and Richard Keys
Gray refused to speak out about his sacking but last week on Talksport he broke his silence and confessed he had found it hard to cope.
He said: ‘It’s obviously affected my life greatly, in many ways. I didn’t expect it. I found it very difficult to cope.
‘It’s what it did to my mother, who is 90, it’s what it did to my future wife, it’s what it did to my daughters. That’s what I will never forgive.
‘I have four daughters, and a mother who brought four boys up, and I’m being accused of what? Sorry, don’t.’
He explained his long silence over the scandal by saying: ‘Me coming out and saying anything would amount to guilt, and I wasn’t prepared to do that.
‘I wasn’t prepared to defend myself from accusations from people who didn’t know me, who hadn’t a clue what my personality was, who didn’t have a clue what I am like as a father, as a husband-to-be soon, and as a son.’
Gray added: ‘It was what followed that upset me more than anything and I found it very difficult to cope with.
‘I had a terrible month at least, trying to come to terms with what I was being accused of.’
When asked by The Mail on Sunday about the sale of the property and why Gray was downsizing, a spokesperson for him said: ‘There is no comment from Andy.’
Share this article:
Here’s what other readers have said. Why not add your thoughts,
or debate this issue live on our message boards.
The comments below have been moderated in advance.
-
Newest -
Oldest -
Best rated -
Worst rated
I don’t really care what he said, but why should a ‘pundit’ earn £1.7 million a year?
Report abuse
Disgraced – by the thought police!
Report abuse
Millionaire cries that he has to cash in a property for £4million to survive – boo hoo !
Report abuse
Small mistake made money months ago, let’s now let him live
Report abuse
Both Grey and Keys got too big for their boots, they both believed their own hype and ended up paying the price. I have no sympathy for either of them, and they obviously didn’t learn to keep some of their opinions to themselves as once again they appear to have landed themselves in hot water by flapping their gums. Honestly they’re like 2 unpleasant schoolboys who are a bad influence on eachother and really ought to be separated!
Report abuse
I am totally uninterested in football but even if I was a huge fan I would be furious that Andy Gray was on such a huge salary just for talking about football. I pay £52.00 a month for Sky and after reading about how much Andy Gray was getting paid I now know why it is so expensive and am seriously thinking of packing it in even though I enjoy tennis and cricket coverage. Why do TV companies pay such ridiculous salaries to people just for talking about sport? It also makes me wonder what salaries Sky’s bosses are on. I am sure that football fans are not too bothered WHO is commenting and would prefer a reduction in their subcription and far less expensive commentators for all sports – I know I certainly would.
Report abuse
So the PC zealots have taken another scalp and what used to be world -renowned eglish humour and reparti is all the poorerWomen’s sport should produce their own officials for their own matches and vice versa
All this mixing-up of races/peoples and sexes etc is there for ONY one reason and that is to create continued confusion amongst the serfs–that is the real game –read a bit of Orwell etc!!
Report abuse
Let him move on, he said something got fired and that’s it. I wish him good luck and hope he has changed.
Report abuse
After all the previous fuss I see that Sky didn’t replace Gray with a woman pundit!! I cancelled my Sky Sports subscription after this farce.
Report abuse
So he made sexist comments ——big deal. the Politically Correct Weasels are in charge sounds like to me.
Report abuse
The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline.