Gordon previously worked for
Sky Sports and Chrysalis. He wrote two books on
Sheffield Wednesday FC. In December 2001, he was nominated for a
BAFTA for producing and directing
Darren Gough’s Cricket Academy. He founded VeryMuchSo productions in January 2001, based in
Sheffield. In 2002, Gordon worked with Nicholas Bonner of
Koryo Tours to bring the seven surviving members of the 1966
North Korea national football team to Britain. The resulting film,
The Game of Their Lives won the 2003 Royal Television Society award for best sports documentary. Daniel was also nominated Best Newcomer at the 2003 Grierson Awards. The film also received a nomination for Best Documentary at the
British Independent Film Awards. It won first prize at the
Seville Film Festival. Gordon and Bonner continued their collaboration to make
A State of Mind, about two North Korean gymnasts preparing for the
Pyongyang mass games, and
Crossing the Line, about
James Joseph Dresnok, the American soldier who defected to North Korea in 1962. The latter film, which was narrated by actor
Christian Slater, was shown at the 2007
Sundance Film Festival, and was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize. Gordon and Bonner were also featured on a
60 Minutes report about Dresnok that broadcast on 28 January 2007 in the United States, and included footage from their film. In 2012, Gordon directed a documentary for
ESPN's
30 for 30 series entitled
9.79* about the 1988 Olympic Men's 100m final and the
Ben Johnson doping scandal. He would direct two more
30 for 30 documentaries in the 2010s—
Hillsborough, a 2014 ESPN–
BBC coproduction coinciding with the 25th anniversary of the
Hillsborough disaster, and
George Best: All By Himself, a 2017 exploration of the life and career of Northern Ireland football legend
George Best that was broadcast as part of the
30 for 30: Soccer Stories sub-series. In 2019 he directed
The Australian Dream, which won the
AACTA Award for best feature documentary in the
2019 series. The film looked at the part played by
racism in the demonising of
Australian Rules football-player
Adam Goodes, who is an
Aboriginal Australian, and was written by award-winning Aboriginal journalist
Stan Grant. Gordon returned to the
30 for 30 series with
The Life and Trials of Oscar Pistorius, a four-part examination of the life, career, and
murder trial of Paralympic sprinter
Oscar Pistorius that premiered in September 2020 on the
ESPN+ streaming service. Gordon also directed
Billion Dollar Heist, 2023 a documentary on the
Bangladesh Bank robbery and
cybercrime. == Personal life ==