Who are the retired footballers who have greyed and aged beyond recognition from their glory days and married younger women?
Here are three of the game’s top scorers who have landed younger beauties, proving that even after hanging up their boots, they can still score big.
Ian Rush and Carol Anthony
We start with Liverpool’s legendary goal scorer Ian Rush who popped the question to an Irish singer and model, Carol Anthony in 2019.
Image of Rush and Carol from Carol’s official Twitter account: @CarolAnthony_
Carol is 22-years younger than Rushy, 61, but she’s previously admitted she doesn’t see the age gap as an issue.
They began dating in 2013, but haven’t set a date yet for their big day. Perhaps with the new year 2023, Rush is setting his eyes on the new goal? That is marrying the model?
Image of Carol from Carol’s official Twitter account: @CarolAnthony_
The Liverpool icon has been in the relationship with the brunette beauty a year after he split up with long-term partner Tracy after 25 years of marriage.
Ronaldo and Celina
Image of Ronaldo and Celina from Celina’s Instagram page: @celinalocks
Next on our list is Brazil legend Ronaldo, who is set to marry for the third time after proposing to his model girlfriend while on vacation in the Caribbean.
The stunning Celina Locks, 14 years his junior, and the former Real Madrid and Inter Milan striker announced their engagement on Instagram with romantic “I love you” messages.
Image of Celina from her Instagram page: @celinalocks
Celina, 32, showed off her ring to fans on social media and wrote in English, “Yes I do,” before adding in Portuguese, “I love you forever @ronaldo.”
The 46-year-old retired footballer, now President of LaLiga side Valladolid, replied: “Love you,” with four heart emoticons.
Teddy Sherigham and Kristina Andrioti
Teddy Sherigham, now 56, is married to gorgeous PR girl Kristina, who is 20-years younger than him.
They got married in Portugal in 2016, and have been together for 15 years and have a son together, George.
Teddy, the prolific Manchester United and Spurs scorer, has another son, Charlie from a previous relationship with Denise Sims.
After news of Gareth Bale retiring at only 33-years-old this year, let’s have a look at the top five footballers who retired too early.
Bale’s retirement has sparked a number of fans citing that he still has a few more years to go. In contrast, he has older peers like Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi who are still breaking records at their slightly more advanced age.
However, Gareth Bale is not the only footballer who decided to retire young. There are a number of footballers who retired when they were even younger than Bale for an abundant amount of reasons. Some either returned back to football, not living up to their former glory though, and some instead found opportunities to become managers.
Apparently, according to sportmob, some players even retired as young as 20-years-old. A majority of them retired at around Bale’s age. It seems that it is the most common age group to retire from football.
List of footballers who retired young:
Number 5, Michel Platini
Image of Michel Platini in 1975, from Wikipedia.
Michel Platini, a French footballer whose career only lasted for 15 years between 1972 and 1987 during which he only served three clubs: Nancy, Saint-Etienne, and Juventus. He is one of the rare footballers with three consecutive Ballon d’Or trophies.
His record scores in the European championship, which was 9 scores, was only surpassed by Cristiano Ronaldo in 2021. His record stayed still for a number of decades. Similar to Tuchel, after retiring from football, he became the coach/manager for the French national team.
He retired in 1987 at the age of 32-years-old. During the time when he retired, he was regarded as France’s top goal scorer. His scores were only beaten by Thierry Henry some two decades later.
Number 4, Eric Cantona
Image of Eric Contona from Wikipedia.
Eric Cantona, a Manchester United player retired from the club when he was 30-years-old, all the way back in 1997. He announced his retirement a month prior and had no specific reason relating to injuries or any other issues.
He has regretted his early retirement by stating, “When you quit football it is not easy, your life becomes difficult. I should know because sometimes I feel I quit too young. I loved the game but I no longer had the passion to go to bed early, not to go out with my friends, not to drink, and not to do a lot of other things, the things I like in life.”
His achievements in football is not something people forgot as he is still mentioned by some fans to this day. He has had successful roles as an actor and starred in a number of blockbuster films.
Number 3, Ruben De La Red
Image of Ruben De La Red from Wikipedia.
Ruben De La Red, a Spanish footballer who retired at the age of 25-years-old. He is regarded to be a product of Real Madrid and has played for only two clubs for the duration of his professional career. His other team was Getafe.
In October 2008, he passed out during a Spanish Cup game against Real Union. As a result, he was taken to the hospital and eventually declared unable to play the balance of the season. Due to his unfortunate heart condition, which forced him to retire early in late 2010.
In 2015 he returned to Getafe as a manager, however this role was short lived as the team was relegated to one tier lower, he then subsequently left the team.
Number 2, Thomas Tuchel
Image of a young Thomas Tuchel, from www.transfermarkt.com
Thomas Tuchel is quite a popular man on Sportsry as we have written a number of articles either about him or ones that are related to him. Many of you may not know that the former Chelsea manager used to be a footballer himself. Unfortunately, he retired at only 24-years-old in 1998.
He was forced to retire due to his knee cartilage injuries. He was quite the prominent footballer in his early days and unfortunately he was robbed of the chance to end up as a legend on the field. However, destiny had another thing coming for Tuchel where he managed a number of prominent European football teams and won trophies for them.
Number 1, Andreas Laudrup
Andreas Laudrup, a 31-year-old Danish footballer born in Spain who had to end his professional career at the young age of 24, similar to Tuchel. He played for just four clubs during the course of his seven-year career: Lyngby BK, FC Nordsjaelland, AS Saint-Étienne, and AGF.
The aforementioned reason for his early retirement was due to his arthritis. Furthermore, his father was a Danish footballer, Michael Laudrup. Unfortunately, he could not live up to his father’s legacy. Who knows, he might be a manager of a prominent team one day and would still make waves in the football realm.
The two youngest retired players from football were only 24-years-old. The both of them had a promising future in this line of work, but fate decided to take them on another ride. For a few that got lucky, they ended up being prominent managers or even movie stars. Regardless, we hope that Gareth Bale will end up somewhere good.
When talking about footballers, we tend to talk about the male counterparts such as Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. Football is usually centred on the games that are played by men as it has been the norm to do so for more than a century.
However, the Women’s Football Association has been around since the 1880s and it is apparent that females have played it for more than a century as well. The first women’s football matches being included in the Olympics only happened in 1996.
Furthermore, back in the 1920s, women’s football gained traction in the United Kingdom. In 1926 a women’s football match managed to garner around 50,000 spectators. Women were not allowed to speak at the FIFA congress until 1986 and the first FIFA’s women’s cup commenced only in 1991.
Now, we have written about the most handsomest footballers, but here’s the list of the most beautiful female footballers done by vbetnews.
Top 5 most beautiful footballers
Number 5, Adriana Leon
Image of Adriana Leon, from her Instagram page.
Adriana, who is 30-years-old, plays in the Women’s English super league cup, representing Manchester United. She also represents the Canadian National team. Her football skills led her to win the Olympic Gold Medal in 2020 while representing Canada.
She has been playing football since she was 15-years-old, possibly even longer. She won as the top scorer for the Canada Summer Games.
Number 4, Alex Morgan
Image of Alex Morgan, from Wikipedia.
Alex, who is 33-years-old and is the same age as Taylor Swift, has a remarkable career in football.
She is a player for both The National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL), the top level of women’s professional soccer in the US, and the US women’s national soccer team. The American professional was named the highest-paid American women’s soccer player in 2015 by Time.
Number 3, Alisha Lehmann
Image of Alisha Lehmann, from Wikipedia.
Alisha, at only 23-years-old, is a footballer for the Swiss national team. She also plays as the forward for Aston Villa.
In October 2017, she received her first cap for the Switzerland women’s national football team. She scored her first goal for her country against Finland on March 2, 2018, a day she will always remember from the 2018 Cyprus Women’s Cup.
Number 2, Nichelle Prince
Image of Nichelle Prince, from her instagram page.
Nichelle, who is currently 27-years-old is a forward from Canada who presently competes for both the Canadian national team and the Houston Dash of the National Women’s Soccer League.
Nichelle Prince was included in the FIFA Women’s World Cup roster for 2019. With her national squad, she has won two silver medals, one bronze medal, and one gold medal. Her most recent achievement came on August 6, 2021, when she and Canada won the Olympic Gold Medal in the Summer Olympics.
Number 1, Lauren Sesselmann
Image of Lauren Sesselmann, from her Instagram page.
Lauren, the most beautiful out of the bunch and who is currently 39-years-old and is older than even Cristiano Ronaldo, is still active in women’s football. She is currently playing for the Santa Clarita Blue Heat.
She won a bronze medal in the Olympics and competed for Canada from 2011 to 2015. In addition, Lauren serves as the host, producer, and trainer for the fitness DVD series Fit As A Pro with Lauren Sesselmann.
Apparently a photo of Ronaldo and Antony taken in a specific pose has gone viral all over social media.
In a football fan page they mentioned that the pose is called the goat challenge and even newscasters are doing it.
Ronaldo’s goals scored
Many were praising him for being ahead of trends. Some are even saying that everything Ronaldo does is beautiful. The pose was done to commemorate his 700th league goal, which to date is one of the most goals scored by a single player.
The ranking for the most scores is complicated as there are claims of other players back in the olden days scoring more than Ronaldo. However, according to the International Federation of Football History and Statistics, Cristiano Ronaldo is the title holder for the most scored goals.
Previously, the title holder was Pele, who held that said title for 50 years with 762 goals under his belt. Another statistical analysis mentioned that Erwin Helmchen who was a German player, active in 1924-1951 scored the most goals in history at a whopping 987+ goals.
Currently, the handsome Portuguese is being called a GOAT, which translates to the Greatest Of All Time and is a high level of compliment to football players. It went to a point where an upcoming singer called Enisa was seen wearing a football jersey with his surname sewn in the back. She even captioned the tweet with “Ronaldo, the goat.”
The singer later then claimed that it was her brother’s jersey and that he wanted to make her a Manchester United fan. She then claims that its slowly working on her. Netizens responded with positive remarks regarding Cristiano Ronaldo.
However, there were some comments disagreeing with the singer’s statement as they claimed that Lionel Messi is the actual GOAT. It may be overwhelming for someone who just started as a football fan to receive a large number of comments debating who is the actual best player.
Ronaldo’s sister slamming Ten Hag
After the whole ordeal of removing him while in game in a recent match against Newcastle, his sister took to Instagram to vent out her frustrations and to defend her brother. She reposted a photo from a Portuguese account that speculated Ten Hag will not last as United’s manager till January and she responded with “it’s too late.”
There was a post on Twitter of Ronaldo and his two sisters, however fans were not too nice to them. Netizens were asking which sister slandered Messi, and others claimed that both equally had their fair share of toxic drama on the internet.
Some were mean towards his sisters by criticising their looks, which is totally uncalled for. Netizens claimed that his sisters are his bodyguards as they always defend him. However, isn’t it a good thing for having your family defending you especially when it’s necessary?
Football is a sport where once you participate in it, you might make it big and gain wealth from it. Obviously there are drawbacks in becoming a footballer as your physical strength has to be at an optimum and your career might be cut short if a serious injury happens to you.
Furthermore, more than 50 years ago, footballers were not making as much money as they are today. For example, Albert Scanlon who was one of the “Busby Babes” who survived the Munich air disaster in 1958 was only purchased by Newcastle United for £18,000 in 1962.
To compare, an inflation calculator stated that £18,000 back then is worth about £454,000 today. Pretty sure that’s how much most Premier League players make in less than a month today and of course their purchase prices would make that inflated number look insignificant.
According to SCMP, here is the list of the richest football players in 2022.
Number 5: Mo Salah
Image of Mo Salah, from Wikipedia.
Mo Salah is the rising star for Liverpool and is currently worth about US $53 million. Currently he has a deal with Adidas and makes a couple of million from that said deal. He also is collaborating with Pepsi, Vodafone, Uber and Oppo.
Currently, the 30-year-old is the highest paid player in Liverpool. Not sure if Jurgen Klopp is too happy about it. His current contract with the club is valued at $60 million.
Number 4: Neymar
Image of Neymar, from Wikipedia.
Neymar who is also 30-years-old, is well known to exaggerate his injuries while on field. Some are even accusing him of potentially being the new meme of this year’s World Cup. However, he is currently worth US $87 million.
He made history with his transfer price to Paris Saint-Germain from Barcelona for a whopping $263 million. Similar to Mo Salah, he has recurring deals from major brands such as Nike, Puma, Gillete and Red Bull.
Number 3: Cristiano Ronaldo
Image of Ronaldo, from Wikipedia.
Cristiano Ronaldo, love him or hate him, the 37-year-old is still one of the richest footballers out there. He is currently worth a whopping $100 million. However, that is not a surprise to many due to him being a superstar coupled with him being in the spotlight for more than a decade.
However, the situation he is currently in with Manchester United, and the alleged accusations of them not paying him on time is concerning. In contrast to the other players, Ronaldo also has his own business and he also signed a US $1 billion lifetime deal with Nike.
Furthermore, he owns multiple properties that are worth millions on their own. He also has a US $24 million dollar car collection ranging from one of the most expensive car manufacturing brands out there to Audis.
Number 2: Lionel Messi
Image of Lionel Messi, from Wikipedia.
The 35-year-old Argentianian player, who is always seen in the same ranks as Cristiano Ronaldo and many of their respective fans would fight against each other about these two is worth US $120 million. In addition to Ronaldo, his car collection alone is worth US $50 million.
He currently owns a fashion store and is a hotelier on his own accord. He currently is the ambassador for Pepsi and Budwiser and is making US $25 million from his deal with Adidas annually.
Number 1: Kylian Mbappe
Image of Kylian Mbappe, from Wikipedia.
The youngest player in the top 5 richest footballers in the world is the 23-year-old French Paris Saint-Germain player. He is worth a whopping US $128 million. It is surprising as he is richer than Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi who are both household names in their own right.
He made history by being the youngest player to earn US $100 million in a year. He is the ambassador for the luxury watch maker, Hublot, where a single watch can cost more than six digits. He has also started a production company this year, and we’ll see where it goes.
To be honest, most of the football players in the Premier League and Champions League are quite handsome. There are some stories that certain people watch the sport just to take a peak off their favourite good looking superstar.
It is a topic rarely talked about as footballers are usually talked about their skills on the field and also their responses in the media, not really about them being handsome or not. Ronaldo has gotten backlash due to his media skills where he exposed the underlying tricks of his club, as an example.
There are still some fans that talk about the looks of the players, but most of the time its to mock their fan base. Regardless, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but this list was done by sportsbrief based on the data they collected.
List of the handsome footballers:
Number five, Antoine Griezmann
Image of Antoine Griezmann, from Wikipedia.
Antoine Griezmann who is now 31-years-old and plays as a forward for the La Liga club, Atlético. Generally speaking, women are usually biasedly more attracted to French men, and fortunately for Griezmann, he is French.
Image of Antoine Griezmann, from Wikipedia.
He is an Aries and is about 176 centimetres tall. He made his senior debut for France at the age of 22-years-old back in 2014. He is not only handsome but also has skills as he won the silver boot in 2018 for helping France score in that year’s World Cup.
Number four, Cristiano Ronaldo
Image of Cristiano Ronaldo, from Wikipedia.
Cristiano Ronaldo is in fact the most popular player in the world. He might even be the most popular person in general with his 500 million Instagram followers. He literally has more followers than Kim Kardashian. That is how popular he is and it appears that he knows he’s handsome.
Cristiano Ronaldo’s controversies and achievements have already been spoken on Sportsry a number of times, but his personal life is not entirely dissected here. He is a married man with a few kids and he is an Aquarius.
Image of Cristiano Ronaldo, from Wikipedia.
Furthermore, he is extremely tall at 187 centimetres. Having a nice face, incredible skills, being Portuguese and being taller than most average men is a blessing in disguise.
Number three, Olivier Giroud
Image of Olivier Giroud, from Wikipedia.
Olivier Giroud is another Frenchman similar to Griezmann. He has been a striker for the Italian club AC Milan and has a strong female fan base. He is 36-years-old and he also plays for the French national team.
Giroud made his international debut at the age of 25-years-old and has made more than 110 international appearances. He also helped France win the FIFA World Cup back in 2018, and has won the bronze boot as he helped France to be the runner up in the UEFA Euro 2016.
Image of Olivier Giroud, from Wikipedia.
Furthermore, he is a Libra and is freakishly tall (which many girls would already count as handsome) at 193 centimetres. It is a given why his female fans like him.
Number two, George Best
Image of George Best in 1976, from Wikipedia.
George Best will always be remembered as a football legend, regardless of him not ever participating in the World Cup. Prior to Cristiano Ronaldo, he was one of the biggest football stars of his era and was the blueprint for the current generation of football celebrities.
The Northern Irish man was also known for his career with Manchester United. He was a winger and an attacking midfielder. Furthermore his sign is Gemini and he was 175 centimetres tall.
Number one, if it’s not obvious enough, David Beckham
Image of David Beckham, from Wikipedia.
The now retired football player, who is a massive superstar post his football career, David Beckham is considered as the most handsome football player. Again, beauty is subjective, but fans mostly agree that he is handsome.
He is one of the most adored players in England, and has done a number of achievements for his country in football. He is the third player on this list belonging to Manchester United. It appears that the club has a thing for good looking overachieving players.
Image of David Beckham, from Wikipedia.
He is a Taurus, and is 180 centimetres tall. Beckham is now 47-years-old and has four children and a happy marriage with Victoria Beckham, the former Spice Girl.
