Souness completes 34-km charity swim

Retired United Kingdom soccer star Graeme Souness — who played for Liverpool in their heyday and for Scotland at three World Cup competitions before becoming a beloved television pundit — has won even more fans by completing a grueling 12-hour charity swim.

The 70-year-old's sponsored swim across the frigid English Channel that separates the UK from France raised 1 million pounds for a charity that helps people with the rare skin disease epidermolysis bullosa.

Souness said he was inspired to attempt the challenging fundraiser after meeting 14-year-old Isla Grist, who has the condition he called "the cruelest disease out there".

"She does this to me every time. She's an inspiration to me — even at my age," he said through tears during an interview on the BBC's Breakfast program ahead of attempting the 33.8-kilometer swim alongside six other swimmers.

The money they raised will go to the charity DEBRA UK, which supports people with the disease that is also called butterfly skin and that causes massive blistering and fragile skin. People with the disease often need to be fully wrapped in bandages that must be changed several times a week in a painful procedure.

Souness and the other five swimmers set off from Dover in the English county of Kent at around 9 pm on Saturday and arrived in France at around lunchtime on Sunday.

Souness said on Radio 5 Live the swim had been far tougher than he expected.

"The first hour we did was in the pitch black," he said. "And although all of us had done some swimming in the dark in early morning time during the winter months, it didn't really prepare us for this first hour."

But he said he eventually managed to find his rhythm.

Epidermolysis bullosa is believed to affect around one person in every 50,000, with about 40 percent of those who get it unable to survive the first year. Most people who have the condition are born with it and almost all die before age 5. Currently, there is no known cure.

"From the time I have spent with Isla and her family, I have seen first-hand the extreme pain this devastating condition causes and the daily challenges it creates," Souness wrote on the team's fundraising page before they set off for the challenge. "I wanted to do something that could make a difference to Isla's life and to the lives of so many others living with EB, and the slightly crazy idea of swimming the English Channel was suggested."

The soccer legend was set to attend a reception at the UK Parliament, the House of Commons, on Monday evening to lobby lawmakers for more support for people with the skin condition and their families.