Bald Footballers: Our Best XI Of Bald Football Players

It is fair to say that any list looking at the ‘best’ of anything will always be subjective. It feels like that is especially the case when you’re looking at something like the best bald footballers. Aside from anything else, what do we mean by ‘bald’? Jack Charlton famously had one of the worst combovers ever seen, yet does the presence of hair mean that he doesn’t get to make it onto our list? It is all very much a matter for debate, which is why we’ve decided to do a Bald XI, along with a bald manager, which then gives us room for manoeuvre in terms of leaving people out.

Regardless, the chances are that you will think someone is missing, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles.

Goalkeeper: Fabien Barthez

There are a number of bald goalkeepers who could’ve made our list, but few of them have the list of achievements associated with their name that Fabien Barthez can boast of. He began his club career with Toulouse in his native France, performing well enough to be bought by Marseille.

@ballerholics Fabien Barthez 🇫🇷 vs England in 1999 🔥 #football #soccer #france #france🇫🇷 #goalkeeper #foru #fyp ♬ original sound – ballerholics

He won a French title and Champions League double there, albeit seeing the former stripped from him due to a match-fixing scandal. Next came a move to Monaco, seeing him win the Ligue 1 title twice to earn a move to Manchester United. He won the Premier League twice with the Red Devils, whilst World Cup and Euro victories with the French national team secured his place in our XI.

Right-Back: Lilian Thuram

Able to play at both right-back and centre-back, Lillian Thuram would be any bald manager’s dream on account of his defensive versatility. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that that means he’s in the team for any reason other than his talent, however.

Thuram played for Monaco, Parma, Juventus and Barcelona in a career that lasted for nearly 20 years at the top, winning titles and domestic cups with those teams as well as a UEFA Cup with Parma. As with Barthez, he also won both the World Cup and the Euros with France.

Centre-Back: Frank Leboeuf

At some point, we will start to look away from France for our bald players, but it turns out the Gaelic nation knows how to produce a talented bald footballer. Leboeuf was also part of the World Cup and European Championship-winning squad of 1998 and 2000 respectively, adding to his trophies.

One of the big reasons he makes it into our Bald XI, though, is the fact that he helped Chelsea to win the club’s first piece of silverware for nearly 30 years when the Blues won the FA Cup in 1997, winning the League Cup a year later and then another FA Cup in 2000, along with both the UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup and the UEFA Super Cup.

Centre-Back: Sol Campbell

It is easy to forget now that Sol Campbell was one of the best English defenders of his generation. The decision to leave Tottenham Hotspur in order to join rivals Arsenal meant that Campbell was forever shunned in one part of North London, whilst some of his…questionable opinions in later life didn’t help.

Sure, Campbell didn’t win anything worthwhile with the England national side, but then who has? What he did do, however, was win two Premier League titles with the Gunners, one of which saw them go unbeaten for the entire season. Add in three FA Cups with them and another with Portsmouth and he earns his place here.

Left-Back: Roberto Carlos

Was Roberto Carlos a true baldie, or did he just shave his head for the hard-man look? When you could take a free-kick like he could, it really does matter. The Brazilian left-back was one of the most exciting talents to emerge out of the country in the modern era, which is saying something.

Having arrived in Europe to play for Inter Milan, he went on to make a name for himself with Real Madrid and scored nearly 50 league goals for the Spanish giants. Ending his career with four La Liga titles and three Champions League wins, as well as the FIFA World Cup, was some achievement.

Defensive Midfield: Patrick Vieira

It is back to France we go for our defensive midfielder, thanks to the achievements of Patrick Vieira in the position. His senior career began at Cannes, moving briefly to AC Milan before signing for Arsenal in 1996. Actually born in Senegal, he moved to France when he was eight and took on French citizenship.

As a result, he was part of that squad that won the World Cup and the Euros back-to-back. Of course, for English fans, he will be best known for his work winning the Premier League unbeaten with Arsenal, which was one of three top-flight titles he enjoyed there alongside four FA Cups.

Midfield: Zinedine Zidane

Ok, this is the second-to-last time we’ll pick a bald French player, but when the player in question is Zinedine Zidane, you’d be mad to leave them out. His career will forever be tainted by the fact that he chose to headbutt Marco Materazzi in the World Cup final in 2006, but he’d already won that eight years earlier.

He also, you guessed it, won the Euros with France in 2000, whilst in a domestic sense, he won two Serie A titles with Juventus and La Liga with Real Madrid, with whom he also won the Champions League, UEFA Super Cup and two Supercopa de España titles.

Midfield: Arjen Robben

The Dutch have produced a fair few baldies over the years, but perhaps none of them had the skill and genius in the boots that Arjen Robben became famous for. His career began with Groningen before he moved to PSV Eindhoven, which caught the eye of newly rich Chelsea.

Thanks to the billions of Roman Abramovich, Chelsea won the Premier League title twice, as well as the same number of League Cups and the FA Cup during Robben’s time there. He also won La Liga with Real Madrid and the Champions League and countless Bundesliga titles with Bayern Munich.

Attacking Midfield: Thierry Henry

The reason why Zinedine Zidane was the penultimate bald player from France is that Thierry Henry exists. Arguably one of the sexiest players who also went on to prove himself to be an adept pundit, Thierry Henry was probably more rightly thought of as a forward than an attacking midfielder.

That being said, we wanted to fit him into our team somehow and he would’ve been brilliant playing in the pocket behind our front two. He won Ligue 1 with Monaco before heading to the Premier League and winning that twice with Arsenal, winning La Liga the same number of times with Barcelona and adding a Champions League title to boot.

Forward: Gianluca Vialli

Whilst those of an older generation will remember Gianluca Vialli as having a full head of hair, anyone younger will only know of him as being a baldy. Born in Italy and playing for Cremonese and Sampdoria, when he was signed by Juventus in 1992, it was for a world record fee.

He won the Champions League, the UEFA Cup and Serie A with the Turin side, joining Chelsea and winning the FA Cup and the League Cup with the Blues as well as the UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup. He then became their player-manager and added another FA Cup to his trophy collection.

Forward: Ronaldo

No, we’re not talking about the Portuguese attacking midfielder who no one loves more than he loves himself, instead talking about the Brazilian whose full name is actually Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima. If you’re a player who is part of the conversation of best-ever of all time, you deserve to be in our Bald XI.

In the case of Ronaldo, he won the Ballon d’Or in 2002, which joined a list of individual honours as long as your arm. Winning the World Cup twice with Brazil, he also picked up trophies in the Netherlands, Italy and Spain, the latter with both Barcelona and Real Madrid.

Manager: Pep Guardiola

There are numerous bald managers who could’ve made this list, not least of all the aforementioned Zinedine Zidane. There are also some who would question whether Pep Guardiola deserves to be here, given the fact that he won his trophies with a Barcelona side that contained Lionel Messi, as well as the best team in Germany and the richest team in England.

@topfootymomentsuk Top 6 Pep Guardiola Moments🤣 #pepguardiola #guardiola #football #soccer ♬ Call Me – Sped Up – plenka

That isn’t a debate we’re willing to get into, however. Yes, it is certainly fair to point out that Guardiola needs to work with the best in the world in order to lift his trophies, but the way that he gets them playing and the trophies that he’s lifted in his career means that he is the only bald manager we could pick for our XI.