Paddy McGuinness gives update on Freddie Flintoff after Top Gear crash

The BBC has announced the motoring programme will be “rested” for the foreseeable future in the wake of the accident.

Flintoff was taken to hospital in December 2022 after he was left with facial and rib injuries in a crash at the Top Gear test track at Dunsfold Aerodrome in Surrey.

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He has since made a gradual return to the public eye, re-joining England’s backroom staff for their T20 series against West Indies earlier this year and as head coach of the Northern Superchargers in The Hundred.

Bolton's McGuinness told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “He’s all right. I’ve not spoken to him for a while, but, you know, he is getting on with it.

“He’s a very resilient character, is Fred. So I’ve no doubt he’ll be right as rain.”

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Preston's Flintoff and McGuinness made their debut as Top Gear hosts in June 2019 joining Chris Harris from the 27th series of Top Gear.

Harris started as a lead host on Top Gear in 2017.

While the show is on pause, McGuinness will head out on the road on a stand-up comedy tour for the first time in eight years.

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He said: “A tour takes up a lot of your time, so I’ve just genuinely never had time to put it in.

“It’s always in the back of my mind. I’m always writing stuff down and when Top Gear was paused, because Top Gear takes a massive chunk of the time, I was like: ‘I can do it now.’

“And if I didn’t do it, I would never have done it and so it’s great because I put the tickets on sale, and they flew out, so it’s quite flattering.

“But then you start thinking: ‘Oh, I’ve got to do it.'”

He will be taking his stand-up show "Nearly There..." around the UK in 2024 and 2025, with the first date at King George's Hall, Blackburn, on October 24.