They say the eyes are the windows to the soul. I believe—and I will prove to you—that body ink, not pupils and irises, provides a much clearer portal into the soul of soccer. Just read the tattoos, and the murkiest corners of the player psyche are instantly revealed. Here, for your edification, are some of the deep psychological insights that I have gleaned from a careful examination of soccer ink.
Players Get Homesick
Transplanted players frequently experience feelings of wistful melancholy. Don’t mock. If you had to leave sunny Seville for rain-lashed Manchester, you might also experience the occasional mood swing. Clubs attempt to ease these transitions by employing professional relocation consultants. But the players are also doing their bit to combat relocation depression, via tattoos.
What better way to counteract homesickness than to contemplate images of one’s hometown monuments, on one’s own body? On Aaron Ramsey’s right leg you will find a touching depiction of Caerphilly Castle, along with St. Michael and other symbols of Welshness.
In a similar vein—and quite possibly on a similar vein—Toby Alderweireld, the Belgian national and Spurs central defender, proudly flaunts a depiction of Antwerp’s cathedral, minus the gift shop, on his right arm.
Players Derive Comfort From Heart-Warming Clichés
Too young to have developed a cynical attitude toward platitudes, players take them at face value and, in so doing, derive emotional comfort from them—which is what we were always supposed to do in the first place, so the laughs are on us cynics. For easy access—unless it’s on your bum, in which case you will need a mirror or two—players archive these needlepoint-worthy declarations on their bodies.
Stoke City defender Glen Johnson’s back declares that “Every man dies, but not every man lives,” which is very twee, but also kind of makes sense. Making a great deal less sense, his right arm wistfully informs us that “Everything happens for a reason.” This is clearly, if I may say so, total bollocks. Every soccer player’s life—and every nonplayer’s life—is a chaotic series of random contingencies, where nothing happens for a reason.
Players Like to Dream
The left hand of Marco Reus—attacking midfielder, winger, or striker for Borussia Dortmund—is emblazoned with the stirring Oprah quote, “The biggest adventure you can have is to live your dreams.”
Sorry lads, but it is hard to think of anything more sick-making than living your dreams … like the one where you are locked in a Primark WC and told to eat your own hair by a disembodied voice, while clutching an aardvark.
Players do not share my qualms about living one’s dreams, however, as evidenced by the fact that Memphis Depay elected to emblazon his chest with the words “dream chaser.” My definition of the word dreams may well be too literal. For soccer lads, as for all sportsmen, “dreams” are a polite euphemism for “stop-at-nothing ambitions.”
Players Like Foreign Languages
“Veni, vidi, vici” (I came, I saw, I conquered), declares Martin Skrtel’s rib cage. Players love foreign languages, especially dead ones. Latin inscriptions such as “Per ardua ad astra” (through hardship to the stars) and “Perfectio in spiritu” (perfection in the spirit—see David Beckham’s right arm) are popular with many lads. These ancient bursts of Latin wisdom add a whiff of Oxbridge gravitas to the “brand” of any player.
A Sanskrit tattoo on Theo Walcott’s right wrist translates as “Beautiful, blessed, strong, intelligent,” dedicated respectively to his sister, Hollie; his father, Don; his brother, Ashley; and his mother, Lynne. (If I were Lynne I would have rather had “beautiful” than “intelligent,” but let’s not start a family row.)
Like yours truly, the Everton forward grew up in Berkshire, where Sanskrit, I can assure you, is the lingua franca.
The inside of Olivier Giroud’s right arm declares, in olde worlde script, “Dominus regit me et nihil mihi deerit.” Translation: “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” In an Arsenal-sponsored YouTube video, Giroud translates it as, “God is my shepherd, and nothing will miss me.”
Players Love Death
“Death,” in the imagination of any player, can occur under a wide variety of circumstances: being axed, benched, bitten, nutted, hair-dryered by your manager, receiving a driving ban after you just sprang for a new Lambo, being spanked by a lesser team in front of 80,000 howling fans, having your girlfriend nicked by a teammate, or getting sent off while your children—whose faces are tattooed on your extremities—watch from the stands. Brazilian David Luiz would probably characterize the 7–1 denouement of the 2014 World Cup as a death experience.
“Death,” in the imagination of any player, can occur under a wide variety of circumstances: being axed, benched, bitten, nutted, hair-dryered by your manager, receiving a driving ban after you just sprang for a new Lambo, being spanked by a lesser team in front of 80,000 howling fans, having your girlfriend nicked by a teammate, or getting sent off while your children—whose faces are tattooed on your extremities—watch from the stands. Brazilian David Luiz would probably characterize the 7–1 denouement of the 2014 World Cup as a death experience.
A large tattoo of a lion is seen on Memphis Depay’s back.
Netherland’s Memphis Depay (center) exchanges his shirt with Italy’s Leonardo Spinazzola (right) during a match on March 28, 2017, in Amsterdam.
Players Are in Touch With Their Feelings
“You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them,” reads an inscription on the lower-left torso of Liverpool center back Dejan Lovren.
During my childhood, the only member of the average working-class family who received these kinds of effusive declarations was the budgie. Excessive displays of affection were met with suspicion: Clearly you had either been drinking or you were going a bit mental. Cut to 2017: Feelings and emotions are lovingly inked onto player bodies, surrounded by cascading hearts and flowers.
. During my childhood, the only member of the average working-class family who received these kinds of effusive declarations was the budgie. Excessive displays of affection were met with suspicion: Clearly you had either been drinking or you were going a bit mental. Cut to 2017: Feelings and emotions are lovingly inked onto player bodies, surrounded by cascading hearts and flowers.
Players Are Impulsive
The most impulsive thing a player can do is to get inked up with the logo of his current club. Lukas Podolski’s old Cologne club tattoo did not go unnoticed on the Arsenal pitch where he later played.
Though wisely reticent to tattoo their current club logo, players frequently memorialize other equally ephemeral aspects of their lives, most notably their WAGs (wives and girlfriends). Many players impulsively adorn their bodies with depictions of the mother of their children, only to divorce her shortly thereafter. In a true fingers-crossed moment, American star Landon Donovan and his first wife, actress Bianca Kajlich, acquired matching hummingbird tattoos because “hummingbirds mate for life.” Sadly, they divorced in 2010.
Players Identify With Angels
Angels are synonymous with miracles, something that players are frequently in need of. Angels are also benevolent guardians, which top-flight soccer stars crave but rarely have. In the absence of an angel, might one become one’s own angel, simply by adding wings?
Lionel Messi has wings on his leg, like the Roman god Mercury but a bit higher up. More often players—including Djibril Cissé, Skrtel, Becks, Stephen Ireland, Marco Materazzi, Gregory van der Wiel—grow wings on their backs, channeling the angel Gabriel. Angelic is not a word that many would apply to ruthless professional players. I am assuming, therefore, that the adoption of wings—Look! I am really an angel!—might also be part of a brand-softening strategy.
In the dizzying world of soccer ink, there is one legendary holdout: Cristiano Ronaldo, who claims that he has eschewed tattoos in order to be able to give blood. (The National Health Service recommends a four-month lag time between giving blood and getting tattooed or pierced.) I suspect that if he wanted a tattoo, he would get one. Which leads me to believe that he has simply opted out. Or maybe he has seized upon the concept of nontattooing as yet another way to float above the rest.