Downham Town coach nets £90k on The Wheel and treats girls’ team

A football coach who netted £90,000 on a TV quiz show is to give some of the cash to her girls’ football team, so they can feel like “football stars”.

Livvi Hodges, from Downham Market, Norfolk, who appeared on the BBC game show The Wheel on Saturday, described the whole experience as “surreal”.

“I just wanted to cry,” she said, after realising she had won. “It just didn’t feel real.”

The show, hosted by comedian Michael McIntyre, involves three contestants answering quiz questions with the help seven celebrities sat around a large wheel.

Ms Hodges, who started the under-13 girls Downham Town football team, was perhaps used to tense moments in a game.

Although this time she was assisted by a range of celebrities, all of whom were “kind and positive”, including singer Robbie Williams, who chatted to her after her performance on The Wheel.

“He was really lovely and really interested in the girls’ football team as well, which was really nice,” she said.

She praised her parents, who were “big cooks”, for helping her with the final winning answer after she remembered them talking about herbs and spices.

Asked which of four herbs had a distinct liquorice-like flavour, she chose the correct answer of tarragon.

She said the pause before the reveal “was very, very nerve-wracking”.

Ruby, aged 11, watched her coach on the show.

“She is so inspirational and is my role model,” she said.

Teammate Isabella, also 11, said of Ms Hodges: “The fact that she is making time for us and getting us the stuff is so nice.”

Meanwhile, Nancy, 11, described her coach’s performance as “amazing”.

“I think she’s a very kind person, and I’m very grateful as a team to have that little extra,” she said.

A plumber for 14 years, Ms Hodges is also a lecturer in plumbing, gas and renewables at the College of West Anglia, based in Norfolk and Cambridgeshire.

She said the cash would allow her to offer her team financial support over the next few seasons.

“Women’s football is so big at the minute,” she said.

“I just feel so happy that I can give back to football and give back to girls’ football and grassroots football.”

The quiz winner, who will be continuing with her day job, said she planned to buy the players football kits and equipment as well as throw them a Christmas party.