Arsenal legend Keown had to ask how to pronounce Premier League manager’s name on MOTD leaving studio in disbelief

MARTIN KEOWN left Gary Lineker and Micah Richards “corpsing” after asking how to pronounce a manager’s name on Match of the Day.

Arsenal icon Keown, 57, joined Lineker and Richards in the BBC studio for Saturday’s edition of Match of the Day.

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Martin Keown had the Match of the Day Studio in stitches with a question he asked Micah Richards[/caption]

BBC

Gary Lineker explained how Keown asking Richards how to say ‘Nuno’ had them ‘corpsing’[/caption]

However, a funny behind-the-scenes tale was revealed by Lineker and Richards on the Rest is Football podcast.

Lineker, 63, explained how Keown had turned to Richards, 35, to check the pronunciation of Nuno Espirito Santo before analysing the 2-2 draw between Nottingham Forest and Wolves.

The former Leicester, Tottenham and Barcelona ace said: “I was trying to help Martin Keown because you know what Martin is like. We had a giggle. Martin’s wonderful, I love him to bits.

“But he does get a little nervous when it comes to his pronunciation of various names and he does tend to ask you quite a lot of times how you say everybody’s name. Including Nuno.”

This sparked Alan Shearer – who was also appearing with Lineker and Richards on the fan favourite podcast – into laughter.

He continued: “Just before his analysis he’s turned to Micah and he went, ‘It’s Nu-no isn’t it, Nu-no?’ And Micah’s gone, ‘Yes course it is’.

“And then Micah and myself were corpsing and Martin was doing his analysis over the pictures but Micah and myself could not look at each other because we were both gone.

“Nobody would have known at home because we were out of vision but Micah had to look completely the other way.

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“He was looking one way and I had to look completely the other way and funnily enough it was towards the monitor that had The Masters golf on…

“But we were both absolutely in hysterics and thankfully it was a long piece of analysis so by the end of it we had managed to get a grip of each other.”

A perplexed Shearer asked: “What else could it f***ing be other than Nu-no?”

With Lineker replying through laughter: “That’s exactly the point. I don’t know. Could it have been Nun-o. It was so funny. I was just wondering whether you were going yo come back from it Micah.”

Richards added: “Honestly I was gone… There’s obviously various cameras in the studio.

“But luckily when we came out it was to a back shot and then a single of Martin. If it had come to a three-shot there I would’ve been in big trouble.

“Because if people see me laughing we’d have to address it. It was madness.”

Keown will not have been much happier on Sunday after seeing Arsenal lose 2-0 to Aston Villa at home and squander their chance to go back to the top of the Premier League table.