Jamie O’Hara's Holiday Misadventure in Albufeira

Jamie O’Hara went to Portugal chasing sun, sea and a quiet break. He ended up under hospital lights in Albufeira with a drip in his arm – and a slice of cheese on toast taking the blame.

The former Tottenham Hotspur midfielder and talkSPORT regular revealed on Instagram on Wednesday night that his holiday had taken a grim turn. The photo was stark: O’Hara on a hospital bed, cannula in his right arm, the caption doing the rest of the talking.

“Got food poisoning from cheese on toast in Albufeira,” he wrote.

For a man who has spent the last year joking about Spurs having an “absolute stinker”, this was his own off-day in the Algarve.

‘Is that possible?’

Back in the talkSPORT studio, the claim stopped breakfast in its tracks.

“Is that possible?” Gabby Agbonlahor asked on Breakfast, baffled that something as basic as cheese on toast could leave O’Hara floored.

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, never shy of a punchline, painted his own theory. “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 then tried to get a bit more scientific about it. Aherne floated listeriosis as a possible culprit – an illness the NHS links to soft, mould-ripened cheeses such as camembert and brie, which can leave you feeling seriously unwell.

‘Boys, it’s not good’

O’Hara, listening in from his hospital bed, sent a video update to the show. The tone was half-gallows humour, half-genuine distress.

“Boys, it’s not good, I’m in a bad place,” he admitted. “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 image that accompanied his earlier post backed up the story. He looked drained, washed out by the ordeal rather than the sun.

“He is whiter than a ghost by the way!” Aherne said after seeing the footage.

“He doesn’t look well, does he?” Agbonlahor added, the laughter finally giving way to concern. “I want to apologise for laughing at you Jamie.”

Calling in Cundy

O’Hara’s misfortune has arrived just weeks before he is due back alongside Jason Cundy on The Sports Bar, where the pair have built a reputation as late-night wind-up merchants as much as football analysts.

The Premier League season will bring them back to the airwaves soon enough, but Cundy’s name was already being floated as part of the cure.

“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 task is simpler than dissecting a Spurs collapse or a title race. He needs rest, recovery and a bit of luck from the room service menu.

The sun, sea and sand can wait. The next time he goes toe-to-toe with Jason Cundy on air, you suspect cheese on toast – and that fateful Albufeira spot, Fat Cats – will be first on the agenda.