Goalhanger, the London-based podcast and media company co-founded by former England footballer Gary Lineker, topped the fifth annual Sunday Times 100 rankings of Britain’s fastest-growing private companies.
According to the newspaper’s announcement, the company recorded £37.9 million in sales in 2025, representing a compound annual growth rate of 321.25% over the past three years. Goalhanger was founded in 2022 by Lineker alongside Tony Pastor, a former ITV sport controller, and Jack Davenport, an audio producer. The three co-founders hold a majority stake in the business.
Goalhanger operates a 15-show network that includes “The Rest is Politics,” “The Rest is Football,” and “WW2 Pod: We Have Ways of Making You Talk.” The company employs 80 people at its London headquarters. In 2025, it generated more than 750 million full-episode views and streams across its network and grew its paid membership base to more than 250,000. Goalhanger expects to entertain one billion people with its audio and video content in 2026.
“We were forced to think much more entrepreneurially about how we could build the business,” Pastor told The Sunday Times. “With our first podcast, we had ads, host-read partnerships, and then a membership scheme for fans to join, a live festival, and then started selling T-shirts. We built it out iteratively.”
Britain’s 100 Fastest-Growing Private Companies
The Sunday Times 100, produced in partnership with private company data provider Beauhurst, ranks independent UK businesses by compound annual growth rate over three financial years. To qualify, companies must exceed £250,000 in sales in the base year, £5 million in the most recent year, and report a profit in their latest trading year.
The 100 companies on this year’s list averaged 108% annual sales growth over three years, reaching a combined £4 billion in revenues, up £600 million from the prior year’s cohort. Together, they employ 13,700 people and created 8,900 jobs over the three-year measurement period. Nearly all plan further hires in the next 12 months, representing approximately 4,200 additional roles.
Forty-five of the 100 ranked companies are based in London. A record 33 businesses have female founders, co-founders, or chief executives.
Goalhanger secured a minority-stake investment from U.S. media firm The Chernin Group earlier this year and in May launched Goalhanger Ventures, an investment and partnerships division focused on creator-led media businesses.
Dragomir is a Serbian freelance blog writer and translator. He is passionate about covering insightful stories and exploring topics such as influencer marketing, the creator economy, technology, business, and cyber fraud.
Goalhanger, the London-based podcast and media company co-founded by former England footballer Gary Lineker, topped the fifth annual Sunday Times 100 rankings of Britain’s fastest-growing private companies.
According to the newspaper’s announcement, the company recorded £37.9 million in sales in 2025, representing a compound annual growth rate of 321.25% over the past three years. Goalhanger was founded in 2022 by Lineker alongside Tony Pastor, a former ITV sport controller, and Jack Davenport, an audio producer. The three co-founders hold a majority stake in the business.
Goalhanger operates a 15-show network that includes “The Rest is Politics,” “The Rest is Football,” and “WW2 Pod: We Have Ways of Making You Talk.” The company employs 80 people at its London headquarters. In 2025, it generated more than 750 million full-episode views and streams across its network and grew its paid membership base to more than 250,000. Goalhanger expects to entertain one billion people with its audio and video content in 2026.
“We were forced to think much more entrepreneurially about how we could build the business,” Pastor told The Sunday Times. “With our first podcast, we had ads, host-read partnerships, and then a membership scheme for fans to join, a live festival, and then started selling T-shirts. We built it out iteratively.”
Britain’s 100 Fastest-Growing Private Companies
The Sunday Times 100, produced in partnership with private company data provider Beauhurst, ranks independent UK businesses by compound annual growth rate over three financial years. To qualify, companies must exceed £250,000 in sales in the base year, £5 million in the most recent year, and report a profit in their latest trading year.
The 100 companies on this year’s list averaged 108% annual sales growth over three years, reaching a combined £4 billion in revenues, up £600 million from the prior year’s cohort. Together, they employ 13,700 people and created 8,900 jobs over the three-year measurement period. Nearly all plan further hires in the next 12 months, representing approximately 4,200 additional roles.
Forty-five of the 100 ranked companies are based in London. A record 33 businesses have female founders, co-founders, or chief executives.
Goalhanger secured a minority-stake investment from U.S. media firm The Chernin Group earlier this year and in May launched Goalhanger Ventures, an investment and partnerships division focused on creator-led media businesses.
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