Mike Tindall, 47, the former England rugby international who is married to Princess Anne’s daughter Zara, said his father, Phil Tindall, died last week at the age of 80.
Tindall announced the death on his podcast “The Good, The Bad & The Rugby” on Wednesday, September 23, 2026. “Unfortunately, my dad passed away last week,” he told listeners. Alex Payne, one of the show’s co-hosts alongside James Haskell, offered condolences on air on behalf of the hosts and the audience.
First Public Appearance Since Death
Mike Tindall made his first public appearance since his father’s death on September 25, the opening day of the Laver Cup at London’s O2 Arena, where he sat with his wife, Zara Tindall. He met co-founder Roger Federer in the stands and was pictured with the players Learner Tien, Francisco Cerundolo and Casper Ruud.
Speaking about the final weeks of his father’s life, Tindall said: “It’s a relief that he’s free from his body now.”
Years Living With Parkinson’s
Phil Tindall lived with Parkinson’s disease, a progressive brain disorder that brings shaking, balance problems and movement difficulties. In his case it also affected his spine and discs, and he needed a wheelchair at times. His illness has been described as a “25-year battle with Parkinson’s.”
The diagnosis came in 2003, the year Mike Tindall was part of the England squad that won the Rugby World Cup in Australia. The news reached him on the way to Sydney. He has said he did not fully register the illness’s impact until several years after the diagnosis.
“Parkinson’s is brutal and there is no let-up from how it attacks the body and changes people,” Tindall told Hello! in May, adding that more than 23 years of the disease had left his father “a shell of what he once was.”
His mother, Linda, a former social worker, took on much of her husband’s care. In 2021, Tindall praised her as “a very stoic, northern lady” who refused to give up on him.
Otley Rugby Club Pays Tribute
Otley Rugby Club marked Phil Tindall’s death with a minute’s silence before its match against Chester last weekend and printed a dedication to him in the match-day program.
“Big shout-out to Otley Rugby Club. They played Chester on the weekend, and they did a minute’s silence to my dad, who was captain in ’72, ’73,” Tindall said on the September 23 episode.
“That little moment, I got to watch it,” Tindall said. “Someone recorded it, sent it to me, and then they wrote a little thing in the programme as well, which I read. But thank you very much to Otley Rugby Club for it.”
Phil Tindall was a fixture at the club in West Yorkshire, the town where his son grew up. He debuted for Otley’s senior side at 17 during the 1963-64 season, played fly-half and center, and captained the club through the 1972 and 1973 seasons. Away from the pitch he worked as a banker.
A badly timed injury cut his playing days short at 27. “He got married in ’69, broke his leg the week before, went down the aisle in a cast,” his son recalled on the podcast. “I mean, it sort of all went wrong. He had to retire at 27.”
Fundraising and Family Life
Mike Tindall has been a patron of Cure Parkinson’s since 2018 and raises funds through an annual Celebrity Golf Classic and cycling and walking challenges. Zara Tindall joined him at this year’s Cure Parkinson’s golf event in May, which fell on her birthday. He has said watching his father’s quality of life decline is exactly why he does not want other families to go through the same thing, and that with today’s greater awareness of warning signs he would have pushed his father harder on exercise had he understood the condition sooner.
Tindall won 75 caps for England between 2000 and 2011 and has since built a career in broadcasting. He has been married for 15 years to Zara Tindall, 45, a successful equestrian and King Charles’ niece. The couple married in July 2011.
Their three children, Mia, 12, Lena, seven, and Lucas, five, are untitled, as Princess Anne declined a title for Zara. Days before news of his father’s death, Mia competed at the Blenheim Palace International Horse Trials on September 19 alongside her mother.
