Top Gear is at the centre of a BBC row over Freddie Flintoff promoting his best friend Jamie Redknapp’s clothing range on the show.
Flintoff has been wearing a variety of Redknapp’s Sandbanks jackets on the motoring series since January 2020.
The jackets, which feature the brand’s distinctive logos, have been featured six times and are often on screen for more than 10 minutes at a time.
Flintoff is also seen wearing a Sandbanks coat in an official BBC photo in which he sits on a yellow Porsche, as well as in a behind-the-scenes shot with co-stars Paddy McGuinness and Chris Harris.
The images have been used on the company’s social media feeds to advertise the brand despite BBC rules banning third-parties cashing in on the corporation’s name.
On one snap with Flintoff, Redknapp posts a love heart emoji, adding: “The big man.”
The snaps were taken down after the Mirror alerted the BBC. It raises questions for the corporation, which is bound by strict conflict of interest rules.
The sports stars have often spoken of their close friendship and share the same management firm M&C Saatchi.
They were team captains on Sky One’s A League of their Own and its spin-off Road Trip shows, during which former Liverpool footballer Redknapp travelled across the UK with the ex-England cricket legend.
Talking about the programme, Redknapp has said: “We love it, we’re all best mates and that’s why A League of Their Own works.”
The pair also worked together in ITV show DNA Journey, where the duo discovered their ancestral roots.
A BBC source said M&C Saatchi had no commercial interest in Sandbanks and did not broker Redknapp’s Sandbanks deal, nor did Flintoff have commercial interests with the brand.
The Beeb’s rules say “on-air talent, in any genre, engaged by the BBC must not accept clothing or products free, or at considerably reduced cost, in exchange for wearing or using them on air.”
A source said they were told that although Flintoff’s coat was a gift from Redknapp, it was “categorically not accepted in return for wearing or promoting it on Top Gear”.
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The BBC bans products being given “undue prominence” but Top Gear said this was not the case.
A spokesman said: “Flintoff has sported a multitude of coats across his 27 filmed episodes but wearing a modestly-branded jacket in six episodes over two separate series does not constitute an editorial guidelines issue.”
They added Sandbanks was asked to take the Top Gear pictures down, saying: “The brand used one of Top Gear’s promotional shots, taken during production, without our permission. We asked this is removed from their Instagram.
“Excluding studio recording and filming requiring specialist clothing, all three Top Gear presenters supply their own wardrobe and they are well aware of the BBC’s guidelines in relation to commercial conflicts of interest.”
Redknapp launched the fashion brand in October 2019, shortly before the garments started appearing on air. Some of the coats retail up to £1,250.
Fellow Sky Sports analysts Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher have also been seen wearing the jackets.
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