Jamie O’Hara's Food Poisoning Incident in Portugal
Jamie O’Hara went to Portugal chasing a bit of sun and a quiet break. He ended up on a hospital bed in Albufeira with a drip in his arm, floored by what he insists was cheese on toast.
The talkSPORT presenter and former Tottenham midfielder revealed his misfortune on Instagram on Wednesday night, posting a picture from hospital with the caption: “Got food poisoning from cheese on toast in Albufeira.”
For a man who has spent the last year rinsing his beloved Spurs for having “an absolute stinker”, it was a line that wrote itself. Holiday of sun, sea and sand? Not this time. This was nausea, drips and a side order of embarrassment.
Back in the talkSPORT studio, the reaction was instant – and ruthless.
On Breakfast, Gabby Agbonlahor couldn’t quite get his head around it. “Is that possible?” he asked, genuinely baffled at the idea that a basic snack could take down a fully grown ex‑pro.
Shebahn Aherne wasn’t buying it either. “I don’t think it is possible,” she replied. “I think he’s had something dodgy before the cheese on toast.”
Agbonlahor then twisted the knife, painting a picture only radio can. “He took his own cheese over to Portugal with him, it’s gone off and he’s eaten it, and got food poisoning?”
The pair tried to make some sense of it. Aherne floated the idea of listeriosis – a foodborne illness linked by the NHS to soft, mould-ripened cheeses such as camembert and brie – as a possible explanation. Whatever the cause, O’Hara clearly wasn’t playing up his condition for the cameras.
He sent a video into the show with a grim fitness update.
“Boys, it’s not good, I’m in a bad place,” he said. “I can’t come on, I am struggling. I’m out in Portugal, I’ve got food poisoning from cheese on toast.
“You’ll love this one as well, the restaurant that I got it from, do you know what it’s called? Fat Cats… Fat, Cats! Honestly, absolute stinker. I’m dying. Sums me up, doesn’t it?”
The name of the restaurant only fuelled the sense of comic disaster. A simple meal, a holiday hotspot, and a place called Fat Cats. Of course it ended badly.
Aherne had seen the video and didn’t sugar-coat the visual. “He is whiter than a ghost by the way!” she said, as the studio tried to balance concern with the sheer absurdity of the story.
“He doesn’t look well, does he?” Agbonlahor admitted, the laughter finally giving way to sympathy. “I want to apologise for laughing at you Jamie.”
O’Hara’s regular home is The Sports Bar, where he trades barbs and punchlines with Jason Cundy, talkSPORT’s chief wind‑up merchant. The pair are due back together for the new Premier League season, their late‑night double act a staple for fans heading home or refusing to sleep after the final whistle.
This time, though, Cundy’s trademark mischief was being prescribed as medicine.
“Do you know what he might need while he’s sitting there in hospital?” Agbonlahor asked, before delivering the punchline. “Jason Cundy, ‘Has anyone seen cheese?!’ That’ll cheer him up!”
For now, O’Hara’s job is simple: get off the drip, out of hospital and back to full strength before the season kicks off and the microphones go live again.
Cheese on toast has had its moment. The next time he’s back on air, you suspect it won’t escape lightly.
