Plenty of footballers love life on two wheels, whether it’s to up their matchday fitness or simply to get around… so we thought it was about time we dusted off the tactics board and brought you the updated line-up of football stars (and some less befitting of the title) past and present who would make our ‘footballers who cycle XI’.

From big names of English major tournament squads to Premier League, Champions League and World Cup winners, this is our 2.0 pedalling players line-up. We’ve even got a proper centre back and some subs now! 

Footballers who cycle 2
Footballers who cycle 2 (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

 

Goalkeeper — Ben Foster

Ben Foster Garmin partnership.JPG
Ben Foster Garmin partnership (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

I mean, was it ever going to be anyone other than the ‘Cycling GK’?

With eight caps for England and nearly 500 appearances across two decades with Manchester United, Watford, Birmingham City and West Bromwich Albion, Foster ticks the ‘safe pair of hands’ box.

> “If a pro cyclist could come into a football club and show the players how hard they work it would really open their eyes”, says Ben Foster

More importantly, with more than 1.2 million subscribers on his YouTube channel ‘The Cycling GK’ where he regularly documents his Zwift exploits and life on a pretty tasty Specialized S-Works Diverge, Foster has clearly caught the cycling bug.

Oh, and back in March last year he joined us for Drink at your Desk Live to tell us all about it…

Right back — Lee Dixon

Sharing a snap of that beauty was always going to go down well with us…

 Centre back — Virgil van Dijk

Virgil van Bike gets the nod to lead the backline. Strong, dominant in the air, with the characteristic Dutch proficiency for playing out from the back. In another life we imagine Virgil shepherding his GC leader to the front of the bunch, taking no nonsense, and never missing the front echelon.

Centre back —Fabio Cannavaro

As far as disastrous selection gaffes go, missing out on this legend of the game first time round is up there…

Fabio Cannavaro (Strava)
Fabio Cannavaro (Strava) (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

Nine domestic honours, including two La Liga crowns at Real Madrid, plus a World Cup win, Ballon d’Or and World Cup player of the tournament vs a midfielder from Bristol City… Fabio, you’re in, lad…

Credit to Gazpacho in the comments for pointing us in the direction of the Italian centre back’s Strava, featuring regular training rides in the hills around Napoli and the occasional trip to Richmond Park.

Fabio Cannavaro (Strava)
Fabio Cannavaro (Strava) (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

 Left back — Moritz Volz

Here’s the giveaway this was written by a Fulham fan…

Like Gareth Southgate we’re shoehorning as many right backs into this defence as possible, but Volz — scorer of the Premier League’s 15,000th goal, prompting ‘15,000 Volz’ headlines across the backpages — is probably one of the more deserving entrants to our squad.

During his time in south-west London the German regularly rocked up to training and matches at Craven Cottage on his folding bike, Jimmy Bullard calling his teammate a “proper weirdo” during an interview with the Guardian.

“He used to cycle to training and occasionally to matches which says it all really,” Bullard said. Nothing weird about that, Jimmy…

Right midfield — Mo Salah

As the song goes: ‘Mo Salah, Mo Salah, Mo Salah, pedalling down the wing…’ or something like that…

The Egyptian King earns a spot in our XI thanks to this lockdown tweet which, painfully predictably, sent the cycling world into meltdown over the hood angle… just enjoy the fact one of the world’s most famous athletes is riding a bike.

Centre midfield — Geoff Thomas

Geoff Thomas
Geoff Thomas (Image Credit: Leukaemia and Lymphoma Research)

Former Crystal Palce, Wolves and England midfielder Geoff Thomas’s cycling exploits are legendary. Having recovered from leukaemia, Thomas won BBC Sports Personality of the Year’s Helen Rollason Award in 2005 having raised £150,000 for Leukaemia Research by riding the entire Tour de France route a few days ahead of the race.

If that wasn’t enough he’s done it multiple times since, and in 2017 rode all three Grand Tours, racking up more than 10,000km. In 2021 he was awarded an MBE for his charity work and this year’s Tour 21 event raised over £800,000 by the time the fundraising riders reached Paris. Captain material.

Centre midfield — Remco Evenepoel

Remco Evenepoel wins 2022 World Championships in Wollongong (@cauldphoto/Specialized)
Specialized) (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

Didn’t think you’d make it through without a Remco mention, did you?

As you’re probably all too aware by now the newly crowned World Champion started his sporting journey on the football pitch, playing for local club RSC Anderlecht before moving across the border to PSV Eindhoven.

A defensive midfielder who could also play left back, Remco was apparently a pretty tidy passer with a good left foot and strong set piece delivery, his stamina moving him into the middle of the park from his early days as a goalkeeper.

Anyway, Remco fell out of love with kicking a ball and took up cycling in his teens. One Monument, a rainbow jersey and Vuelta a España later, I think we’re all pretty happy he did…

Left midfield — Arjen Robben 

Yeah we know he played on the right and loved cutting in but we can’t have two right wingers…’Arjen lad, just beat your man and stick it in the box’…

Speaking to the Daily Mail in 2004 while at Chelsea, Robben responded to a quizzical question about him cycling to training… “Why not? The new complex is very close to where I live with my girlfriend, and if the weather is nice I can go by bike again…

“When I started playing first-team football, I didn’t actually have a driving licence. I had to go by bike. I used to cycle 10 kilometres each way to school every day, and I used to cycle to training as well.”

Robben scored 37 goals in 96 caps for…yep, you guessed it, the Netherlands, playing the full match as his nation lost to Spain in the 2010 World Cup final.

Striker — Alan Shearer

Getting on the end of Robben’s crosses will be Big Al, the Premier League’s all-time record goalscorer and proud member of the N+1 club…

Striker — Michael Owen

Up top alongside Shearer is another famous England name from the 90s/00s heartbreak era — Michael Owen. The man who made live blog headlines after taking a dive when he forgot to unclip as he returned home from a ride. 

Come on, ref, that’s got to be a yellow…

Sub — Joe Williams

Sorry, Joe, your brief stint at centre back is over. If it’s any consolation, that Fabio bloke’s pretty good…

Unless you’re a regular down Ashton Gate you’re probably now shouting ‘who?’ at us — no offence, Joe — but the Bristol City scouser’s enthusiasm for saddle height adjustments, only to nearly crash into a teammate and blame his “deathtrap” machine was weirdly relatable and earns him a spot on our bench.

Is he a centre back? No. Did we ask him to play there until a reader pointed us in the direction of a World Cup and Ballon d’Or winner? Absolutely.

Sub — Terry Butcher

Hopefully putting Butcher on the bench doesn’t cause too much trouble in the comments. Another pointed out to us by a reader, (good shout stonojnr) the former Ipswich, Rangers and England rock at the back has taken up cycling post-retirement and in 2016 rode to Amsterdam with a peloton of Tractor Boys’ fans to relive the glory of the 1981 UEFA Cup win.

Sub — Roy Keane

Another call attracting howls of ‘you don’t know what you’re doing’ from the terraces, we’re benching Keane…

Roy Keane (via Instagram/Roy Keane)
Roy Keane) (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

The problem is working out who to drop? Remco and Geoff Thomas are non-negotiable and as Mike Bassett once so eloquently put it — “442 is our preferred formation”, or something like that…

Sub — Nicklas Bendtner

Nicklas Bendtner (Lasse Andersen/Instagram)
Instagram) (Image Credit: Farrelly Atkinson)

Keane and Bendtner in the same dressing room could be a challenge, but the ‘Lord’, more famous for his off-field antics than 24 goals in 108 appearances for Arsenal and 30 goals in 81 Denmark caps, is a decent option to have off the bench and even holds the fastest goal ever scored by a Premier League substitute (six seconds vs Tottenham back in 2007).

More importantly he rides a BMC… (shout out to camstrup for this spot)…

Managers — Roberto Mancini/ Neil Warnock 

Every top team needs a great manager, but how about this for a double-act? Scarf-wearing Italian charmer Roberto Mancini alongside the Football League’s finest fisherman Neil Warnock. 

Mancini, the Premier League-winning manager who arrived at Manchester City’s training ground aboard his £2,500 road bike and cites Francesco Moser and Marco Pantani as his heroes.

Warnock, the journeyman promotion specialist who takes his riding at a more leisurely pace…

We feel like these two should be snapped up for ‘Neil and Roberto’s Italian adventure’ by one of the more obscure ITV channels and spend the summer jaunting around the Italian countryside by bike, wine tasting and reminiscing about the good ol’ days.

If by any chance, this culture-crossing duo doesn’t work out then there’s always this fella waiting in the wings to shake things up…

That’s our XI, but who have we missed out? Get your suggestions in the comments. Just don’t mention Kevin Keegan…