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August 25 2008 |
Stumped by stubble, the beard is back... |
One of my mates is getting married soon, which means the stag do is looming. But instead of going to Riga for a weekend of debauchery he’s hosting a Seventies and Eighties retro-themed football match. We’re talking sweatbands, sambas, Tango balls, and, of course, lots of facial hair. Back in the day, seeing players with beards and moustaches was commonplace, which got me thinking — there just isn’t enough facial hair in the modern game. So, as I’m getting a bit of a growth going for this stag do and thinking of keeping it for the rest of the season as part of a new campaign to bring the beard back into football. The daddy of bearded footballers was the legendary Socrates. He had that Che Guevara-thing going on and was the coolest dude ever. Second to him was Sergio Batista, who looked like he’d just stepped out of his cave, and what about the Motherland’s Bee Gee, Paul Breitner? But that was the great thing about beards in football back then — they were the real deal and not some fashion statement like they are now. In Germany we’ve gone from Breitner to Kevin Kurányi, whose facial hair looks like it’s been as carefully crafted as a girl’s eyebrows. Don’t get me wrong, I’m as metrosexual as the next bloke, but as far as I’m concerned that’s just not what having a beard is all about. But there are still some decent beards around in football if you look hard enough, and I’ve even had the pleasure of playing with a couple. Claus Jensen often used to sport a decent growth, mostly because he couldn’t be bothered to shave, and Sylvain Legwinski also had a legendary beard that suited his bohemian university lecturer vibe — along with the fags, sandals and battered old VW. There are others knocking about, too. Olof Mellberg can look impressively yeti-like at times, while Reading’s gun-toting Marcus Hahnemann has been known to sport a decent goatee and his countryman, Alexi Lalas, used to have a huge growth back in the Nineties, too. Mind you, that was a bit ill-advised — when you’re a ginge you should be limiting your hair growth as much as possible, not exaggerating it. So with all this inspiration, and with the stag do looming, what kind of beard am I going for as part of my quest to bring proper facial hair back into football? Well, I have to admit, my choice is limited given that my growth around the top lip area isn’t the best — a bit embarrassing given that I come from the home of the ’tache. I’m basically the opposite of Gary Neville, whose top lip never looks far from breaking out into a full-blown growth. But as it stands I’m looking more like Mr Glastonbury, Michael Eavis. It’s all going on around the chin and cheeks. I went on beards.org to get some growing tips and it was there that I found out mine is officially called the “chin strap”. I also found out that Robert Pires has a “soul patch” and that the difference between “mutton chops” and “friendly mutton chops” is the presence of a ’tache in the latter. That said, the model on the website looked like a serial killer, so I’m not sure “friendly” is the right term. I also found out that there is a World Beard Growing Championships, too — set up by the Germans, of course. The next championships are in Alaska next May. So what do you reckon, now I’ve started, should I keep going? It’d be nice to win a trophy at the end of the season. Wild whiskers versus flounce, fluff and fuzz Volzy’s football facial hair top five Volzy’s football facial hair flop five
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