Skip to main content
MusicRadar MusicRadar The No.1 website for musicians
UK EditionUK US EditionUS AU EditionAustralia SG EditionSingapore
Sign in
  • View Profile
  • Sign out
  • Artist news
  • Guitars
  • Controllers
  • Drums
  • Keyboards & Pianos
  • Guitar Amps
  • Music Gear Reviews
  • Synths
  • Software & Apps
  • More
    • Recording
    • DJ Gear
    • Acoustic Guitars
    • Bass Guitars
    • Tech
    • Tutorials
    • Reviews
    • Buying Guides
    • About us
More
  • "She knew what she'd created": Back to Black
  • Trower's '80s supergroup
  • Music theory tricks
  • Stage Tour game
  • 95k+ free music samples
  1. Artists
  2. Guitarists

10 football-mad guitar heroes

News
By Henry Yates
Published 27 August 2014

Soccer-loving six-stringers

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Pete Doherty

Pete Doherty

Around the world, and certainly within the UK, the only thing capable of inspiring as fanatical a following as music, is football. Here’s our pick of 10 famous guitar players and their club of choice…

Pete Doherty

Team: Queens Park Rangers

As a teenage stoner, the Libertines frontman edited a QPR fanzine called All Quiet On The Western Avenue and treated the team’s ground like his own personal squat:

“I would climb into Loftus Road in the summer when the stadium was empty and sit there with my little book and pen, smoking a spliff behind the goal.”

Page 1 of 10
Page 1 of 10
Serge Pizzorno

Serge Pizzorno

For the Kasabian man, the Midlanders’ chilling mediocrity is the whole point.

“The great thing about Leicester City is we’re shit,” he told Four Four Two. “We are absolutely rubbish. But that doesn’t matter, because every so often when we do achieve something, it’s all the sweeter after so much suffering.”

Page 2 of 10
Page 2 of 10
Bryan Adams

Bryan Adams

The wedding-dance king adopted the Blues when he moved to London.

“It’s easy to walk to,” he reasons. “My first game was in 1985. The fans recognise me, but they don’t hassle me, It’s just [cockney accent] ‘Alwight...?’”

Page 3 of 10
Page 3 of 10
Steve Jones

Steve Jones

As a teenage oik, the Sex Pistols guitarist was a face in the Craven Cottage stands.

“I never watched the game,” Jones clarifies. “I used to go for the aggro.”

Page 4 of 10
Page 4 of 10
Slash

Slash

“I’m a football fan and I always root for Stoke, because they’re the underdog,” said the guitarist, interviewed at half-time in the 2011 FA Cup Final between Man City and Stoke.

“They’re a great team, but they never quite make it.” [They lost 1-0].

Page 5 of 10
Page 5 of 10
Simon Neil

Simon Neil

“I’d rather not say who I support,” squirmed the Biffy Clyro singer, in a 2010 video interview ahead of the Old Firm clash with Celtic.

“It’s a family thing. I don’t go to the games, but that’s my team.”

Page 6 of 10
Page 6 of 10
Ronnie Wood

Ronnie Wood

The Black Country sloggers are the unlikely choice of rock royalty, with Eric Clapton wearing the club scarf on the sleeve of Backless and the Stones’ guitarist admitting a “soft spot” for the Baggies:

“They were very big in the 50s. It’s a bit like my boys now supporting Arsenal and Chelsea.”

Page 7 of 10
Page 7 of 10
James Allan

James Allan

As a flying teenage winger, the Glasvegas frontman played 105 games in the Scottish Football League, but daydreamed of a place in the double-winning Celtic side of the late-80s:

“I’d love to have been a sub or even just trained with them. The players around that time were as artistic as any painter.”

Page 8 of 10
Page 8 of 10
Paul McCartney

Paul McCartney

“My family are officially Evertonians,” Macca explained of his dual allegiance.

“But I thought, ‘You know what? I am just going to support them both, because it’s all Liverpool and I don’t have that Catholic-Protestant thing’.”

Page 9 of 10
Page 9 of 10
Noel Gallagher

Noel Gallagher

The former Oasis guvnor is a ‘proper’ fan - he supported City before the 2008 injection of sheikh-dosh that transformed them from whipping boys to champions.

Noel also hates local rivals Man United with such venom that when their defender Gary Neville quoted an Oasis lyric, he threatened to “tie him to a chair, pull his tash out and shit in his manbag”.

Page 10 of 10
Page 10 of 10
CATEGORIES
Guitars
Henry Yates
Read more
Ian Anderson in the 1970s
Artists “I gave up guitar when I heard Clapton, the way people are put off tennis when they watch Federer”
 
 
Johnny Marr [left] and Andy Burnham [right] playing some Smiths for a Ukrainian soldier
Artists Johnny Marr reacts to British PM Andy Burnham playing the Smiths on guitar for soldiers in Ukraine:
 
 
Noel Gallagher and Harry Kane composite image
Singles And Albums “It belongs to the people”: Noel Gallagher supports Wonderwall becoming England’s World Cup anthem
 
 
Johnny Marr and Noel Gallagher
Guitars “It’s the only guitar that I’ve ever had stolen, and the neck was like a ’50s Les Paul. It was amazing”
 
 
Bruce Springsteen sits in with the Gaslight Anthem at the 2024 Sea.Hear.Now Festival
Artists Brian Fallon on the Roy Buchanan trick that Bruce Springsteen taught him on guitar
 
 
Artists “I spent hours in the studio on this one song. I probably spent $10,000 trying to get it to work”
 
 
Latest in Guitarists
Johnny Marr and Noel Gallagher
Guitars “It’s the only guitar that I’ve ever had stolen, and the neck was like a ’50s Les Paul. It was amazing”
 
 
Tony Iommi sitting at a table
Guitarists “I didn't like the idea of: 'Now here’s another album'": Tony Iommi on Sabbath never recorded a follow up to 13
 
 
Blues legend Buddy Guy plays the 2023 Savanah Music Festival
Artists Buddy Guy at 90 – how the world’s greatest living bluesman transformed guitar
 
 
Queens Of The Stone Age pictured in 2026
Artists How QOTSA found their album centrepiece at 2am, a “little drunk” and ready to go home
 
 
Brian Fallon and Brandon Flowers
Artists How Brian Fallon and Brandon Flowers teamed up to write a song with no chorus
 
 
Kevin Parker of Tame Impala
Guitarists “Please don’t be offended”: Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker says no more autographs
 
 
Latest in News
Liam and Noel Gallagher
Gigs & Festivals “Come witness the fitness. It shall be a sight to behold”: Oasis confirm live dates for next year
 
 
Richard Jupp of Elbow performs at Day 1 of Pinkpop Festival at Megaland on June 12, 2015
Drummers “It meant stepping away from an identity": Richard Jupp on why he quit Elbow for sobriety
 
 
US rapper, singer, dancer and DJ, Benjamin Haggerty, known as Macklemore, performs at the Goldencoast Rap Festival in Corcelles-les-Monts, near Dijon, central-eastern France, on August 30, 2026
Gigs & Festivals “My message is for peace”: Pink, Joe Bonamassa and Foo Fighters are all drawn into Macklemore kerfuffle
 
 
Johnny Marr and Noel Gallagher
Guitars “It’s the only guitar that I’ve ever had stolen, and the neck was like a ’50s Les Paul. It was amazing”
 
 
Cartoon man with moustache singing
Singers & Songwriters “Meatloaf dippers, oh so light and yummy/Go on and warm your tummy”: Listen to Bon Iver's maddeningly catchy ad jingle
 
 
Tony Iommi sitting at a table
Guitarists “I didn't like the idea of: 'Now here’s another album'": Tony Iommi on Sabbath never recorded a follow up to 13
 
 

MusicRadar is part of Future plc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.

Add as a preferred source on Google Add as a preferred source on Google
  • About Us
  • Contact Future's experts
  • Terms and conditions
  • Privacy policy
  • Cookies policy
  • Advertise with us
  • Accessibility Statement
  • Careers

© Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA. All rights reserved. England and Wales company registration number 2008885.

Please login or signup to comment

Please wait...