By Liam Rafferty
Former Stoke City, Cardiff City, and Barnsley striker Jon Parkin made an unexpected appearance as a mascot for Dorking Wanderers in their National League South match against Weston-Super-Mare at Meadowbank.
On January 18th, league leaders Dorking suffered a surprise home defeat, with Weston-Super-Mare securing a 3-1 victory.
Goals from Luke Coulson, Pedro Borges, and Sam Pearson sealed the win for the visitors, while Rhys Murphy netted a late consolation for the hosts.
However, the biggest shock of the day came before kick-off when 43-year-old Parkin emerged from the tunnel as one of Dorking’s mascots.
Stunt
The Yorkshireman, best known these days as one of the co-hosts of the Under The Cosh podcast alongside former Sunderland forward Chris Brown and presenter Chris Brown, was caught off guard by the stunt.
The podcast is currently filming a ‘European tour’ series, which began in Italy with the Derby della Capitale (Roma vs. Lazio) before heading to Scotland for Dundee vs Celtic.
For their third episode, they travelled to Surrey to watch this National League South fixture and sprung the mascot role on Parkin as an unwelcome surprise.
Unsurprisingly, he wasn’t thrilled with the idea, even searching for train tickets to leave.
But despite his initial reluctance, the video shows him eventually donning a full Dorking Wanderers kit and lining up with the other mascots – who were all children.
To his credit, Parkin embraced the moment by waving to the crowd and also smiling as he walked onto the pitch, hand-in-hand with Dorking captain Charlie Carter.
Afterwards, Parkin reflected on the experience and even admitted that he enjoyed being the mascot for the match.
“I absolutely loved it,” he said.
“I said to the captain, ‘I’ve played 680 games,’ and he said, ‘I know – what are you doing here?’”
The Wanderers are at home to Farnborough on 22 February in their next match in the National League South.
