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Betfair Big Interview: Geoff Thomas on the state of play in The Championship

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Former Crystal Palace and England midfielder - and now marathon man - speaks to Betfair as the Championship begins to heat up

We would have said that Betfair caught up with former England midfielder and Crystal Palace captain Geoff Thomas before Sunday's Flora London Marathon - but he was going too fast for us! Instead we waited until he finished his last training session then asked about running and the race for promotion to the Premier League.

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Geoff, we take our hats off to you for all your charity work. How has your training for Sunday been going?

Well it was meant to start in February but on my first run I thought I'd push myself, went up quite a steep hill and damaged my knee to a point where training never happened for another four weeks! I was at least semi-fit before but running is a totally different thing.

Were you a good runner in your playing days?

No, in a word. If it was a short distance and a quick rest then go again, I could do that all day long, but when it came to just plodding round the pitch I wasn't the best. There were worse than me, but not too many.

Who was the best you played with?

I can remember one guy at Crewe who was on trial. Dario Gradi used to get us to do a long cross country through Delamere Forest and this guy ran the last two miles backwards because he was so far in front. When it came to the first game of the season, though, he was absolutely shattered so it was bizarre. Andy Gray at Crystal Palace was probably the worst, he grumbled all the way round, but then there were people like Ian Wright and Alan Pardew who could trundle along all day.

Are you ready for Sunday?

Everybody gets to the point where you wish you'd done a lot more. I think apart from the elite people nobody knows if they have done enough, especially first timers. There's a lot that could go wrong that you are hoping doesn't. I've seen the film of the first one in 1908 with the guy coming into the stadium and wobbling around all over the place. He looks like an old man, although he was probably quite young when he set off! He was wobbling everywhere for the last 400 metres and it's that fear of doing that last bit in the full glare of everybody that troubles me. I'm just hoping my legs are still mine with some control over them. I've got this image of tottering down the Mall with everybody laughing saying: 'Isn't that the bloke who missed the chip against France?!'

Since you recovered from leukaemia you've ridden the Tour De France route twice. How does this compare with your cycle training?

What that did was allow me to work with no impact. You could build up and get fitter without feeling niggly. You'd get muscle soreness but no joint soreness. Running is different. I find if I do a hard run it takes several days for the knees to recover. That's just years of playing football and so many operations. I'm fortunate really, having had two cruciate operationss on my right knee and one on my left, that I don't have real bad knee problems. Sometimes it just tells me you've done too much. That was what happened at the start of my training and it's probably cost me six miles of confident running. Everybody says the crowd inspires you round so I just hope they are right.

It's an old cliché that the Championship race is also a marathon and not a sprint. How do you see that finishing up this season?

It's tough to pick a winner at the moment. From the start Watford went off like a hare, then they seemed to decide they didn't want to win it, then West Brom went on a run and seemed to decide the same, Stoke did too and now they are floundering. It's timing the spell when you have a run of form. Hull are on it at the moment, and if they can keep it up they've a great chance, but can they? West Brom have games in hand so you think they are primed to get one of the top spots, but the way it has gone is so competitive.

Could Wolves still get there?

Yes they could, and looking at my old clubs Crystal Palace have just had a great result too at Stoke to put themselves back in the hunt. There's a couple below them with games in hand, but it seems the way it is going this year points on the board are more important than ever. Pressure is starting to show on a few of the teams. Hull seem to have been inspired, and they must have a chance. Bristol City have been more dogged but are also slipping. It's really exciting to see who will get across the line.

If it came to a play-off between Palace and Wolves where would your heart go these days?

I think behind the sofa, too scared to watch! Palace obviously saw my best years as a player and my best football, but I always see what could have happened at Wolves, to be honest. It was such a changing time for the club when I was there, going from the old to the new, and you felt you were part of something that was really exciting. They got hammered by injuries, unfortunately, but I have a lot of time for the club because when I was seriously injured with a cruciate knee problem and thinking my career could be over they really backed me up. Not one person ever for one moment suggested I should pack in. Palace at the moment remind me of when Iain Dowie went there a couple of years ago and they went on a run, and they have been similar under Neil Warnock. You just think the club can't do it again, surely, but then you start to wonder. They've been steady and got back into the top six again.

People criticise the league for a lack of quality. Is that fair?

No. How can you say that when three sides from the Championship get to the FA Cup semi-finals. And don't forget that Middlesbrough had their best side out and Cardiff beat them and played some great football, McPhail and Whittingham were first class. There might be a gap between the bottom half of the Championship and mid-table of the Premier, but between that there's not a lot. For instance I've seen Fulham the last couple of weeks and I don't think they are better than anybody in the Championship.

If you've got to name three to go up, who will it be?

I think West Brom because they've got the biggest squad and most attacking options, but beyond that it's hard to say. I think Hull because they are playing with confidence and have a lot of loan signings. I reckon Watford as the others, but once it is down to the play-offs you can stick a pin in them.

We've got a free £50 bet towards your fund raising. Where will it go?

Thanks. I'll add it to the fund for my own charity - more details on www.geoffthomasfoundation.com. We are trying to make new treatments and equipment available to more cancer and leukaemia patients. I'll put the money on Hull to finish top at [4.4]. I just think they have the impetus with them and Phil Brown is possibly the most experienced of the managers to handle the pressure.