Former Premier League stars who are now hard to recognize: from Manchester to Arsenal

We have com­piled a list of for­mer Man­ches­ter Unit­ed, Arse­nal and Liv­er­pool stars who have changed beyond recog­ni­tion!

Brian McClair

Let’s start with Bri­an McClairhe spent in “Man­ches­ter Unit­ed» 11 years as a play­er and even more so as a club coach. Changes in his image are vis­i­ble to the naked eye: he now has a long gray beard and much longer gray hair. In Jan­u­ary, after the accom­pa­ny­ing pho­to was pub­lished on Twit­ter, his image was dis­cussed by all and sundry. He was pho­tographed inGold­en Cup”, a Man­ches­ter pub not known as a hang­out for the rich, famous or any of them. His long hair and Methuse­lah-like beard have sparked com­plete­ly unfound­ed debate on social media about his well-being.

Brian McClair - then
Brian McClair - now

It start­ed dur­ing self-iso­la­tion, he says about his hair­style. “I just thought, let it grow and see where we end up. Then before Christ­mas I decid­ed to clean up my act but nev­er got around to it. I’m out one night and the next thing I know I’m on social media like the “old guy in the pub”. I’ve had trim­mings ever since. You’ll be dis­ap­point­ed to know that I look a lit­tle less like I was marooned on a desert island”.

Stephen Hunt

For­mer Irish inter­na­tion­al Stephen Hunt retired from foot­ball in 2016 after spells for Read­ing, Brent­ford, Hull, Wolves, Ipswich and Coven­try. Between 2007 and 2012, the Irish­man rep­re­sent­ed his coun­try 39 times.

It’s been sev­en years since the curly-haired foot­baller ditched his locks in favor of ele­gant gray hair and sides.

Stephen Hunt - then
Stephen Hunt - now
Adam Traore

Adam has Malian roots but is a Span­ish cit­i­zen. Already at the age of 8 he began his foot­ball career. At the age of 19, he takes a step towards change and leaves for Eng­land. He was invit­ed there by the Aston Vil­la team, which played in the first strongest Eng­lish foot­ball divi­sion of the Pre­mier League. At that time, Adam did not stand out from oth­er foot­ball play­ers. He did not have any phys­i­cal strength or mus­cu­lar­i­ty, and his first expe­ri­ence in the Pre­mier League was not suc­cess­ful.

Defender Armand Traore made his Arsenal debut aged just 17 and sported a predominantly fine hairline during his time at the Emirates
Armand Traore changed his hairstyle

Since mov­ing to Mid­dles­brough in 2016, Tra­ore has gained some weight and is wider than his time at Barcelona. He hired his own phys­io­ther­a­pist and mas­sage ther­a­pist, and also fol­lows a diet that lim­its the con­sump­tion of sweets, fat­ty and starchy foods.So this is a sprint­er, not a foot­ball play­er!”, they say about Adam. His fig­ure and mus­cu­lar­i­ty make it pos­si­ble to con­fuse him with a body­builder. He plays on the right wing field.

Adam Traore
Adam Traore
Dirk Keith

Dirk I became acquaint­ed with big-time foot­ball at the age of five, and at thir­ty-four I already became the dis­cov­ery of the World Cup. Now the foot­ball play­er is 43 years old. At the begin­ning of 2008, Dirk Kuyt began play­ing as a winger and became one of the most use­ful and beloved play­ers in Liv­er­pool. After start­ing his coach­ing career, Kei­th trad­ed in his dirty blonde hair for some­thing more sophis­ti­cat­ed.

Dirk Kuyt - then
Dirk Kuyt - now