Hoddle and Waddle, Gazza and Johan Cruyff: a list of footballers releasing (mostly bad) songs

Arsenal goalkeeper Petr Cech is to release a charity single this week with collaboration from former Queen drummer Roger Taylor

Arsenal goalkeeper Petr Cech will retire from football at the end of the 2018/19 season. Reuters

Footballers turning their hands to music is nothing new.

To mark his retirement at the end of the season, Arsenal goalkeeper Petr Cech, 36, is this week releasing a charity single having roped in former Queen drummer Roger Taylor to help him out.

The self-penned debut single That is Football is being released for charity, so we won't be too mean on the former Chelsea goalkeeper. But seriously, a song performed by two drummers, don't expect a Grammy award.

Here's a list of other footballers who turned their hand to crooning.

Petr Cech

Cech has won just about every major honour during his career, including four Premier League titles and FA Cups, as well as the Champions League and Europa League, so it's safe to say he is pretty handy with his hands.

And subscribers to the giant Czech's YouTube channel will note he is quite the accomplished drummer, too.

Maybe the single won't be too bad after all.

Glenn Hoddle and Chris Waddle

Messers Hoddle and Waddle were two of the most gifted English players of their generation. But while they dazzled on the pitch, they fizzled out in the studio. Somehow the Tottenham Hotspur and England duo charted at No 12 in the UK charts in 1987 with the toe-curling Diamond Lights. Waddle's wooden appearance on long-running popular music show Top of the Pops says it all.

Basile Boli and Chris Waddle

Waddle would later admit that appearing on Top of the Pops was the most embarrassing moment of his life.

We would like to challenge that claim. His collaboration with then Marseille teammate Basile Boli on the part-rapped, part-sung We've Got A Feeling is just as uncomfortable.

Ian Wright

The former Crystal Palace, Arsenal and England striker was at the height of his fame in early 1990s and even had his own TV show.

To be fair to Wright, he can hold a note better than most on this list, although his choice of hat - not quite beret, not quite flat cap - for his 1993 release Do The Wright Thing is a fashion faux pas in any decade.

The song reached No 43 in the UK singles chart.

Paul Gascoigne

Cast your mind back to October 1990 and Gazza had the world at his feet.

The Tottenham midfielder was voted the best young player at Italia 90, had captured the hearts of a nation with epic performances and won sympathy for his tears after receiving a yellow card in the semi-final against West Germany that would have ruled him out of the World Cup final.

Gazza was in the white-hot heat of his fame. Think Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo's popularity combined in an age before the Internet was even a real thing.

So how do you cash in on that kind of stardom? You release a record, of course. The England international sung on a heavily reworked version of Geordie folk band Lindisfarne classic Fog On The Tyne.

It reached No 2 in the UK charts. Annoyingly catchy.

Andy Cole

After helping Manchester United win an unprecedented treble of Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League in 1999, Cole penned and performed the lyrics to Outstanding. The song was anything but.

Jese Rodriguez

The Spanish striker's career has stalled somewhat after bursting on to the scene at Real Madrid. A move to Paris Saint-Germain has been about as successful as Steve Bruce's venture into the literary world, having spent the past three seasons not scoring many goals at Las Palmas, Stoke City and Real Betis.

Fortunately for the 26-year-old, he may have a career in pop music to fall back on if things in football don't pan out.

Performing under the stage name Jey M, the video to his debut solo hit single Yo Sabia has been viewed more than 31 million times on YouTube.

It's not bad, either.

Kevin Keegan

Head Over Heels In Love is the work of former Liverpool and England striker Keegan crooning to a the type of song that was very much in vogue in the late 1970s.

Keegan, like most on this list, attempted to cash in on his fame through the medium of song. He was voted the best footballer in Europe for a second successive year in 1979 while at German club Hamburg and immediately hit the recording studio to release this love ballad that charted at No 31 in the UK.

Johan Cruyff

It's probably no exaggeration to say that everything that is good about the way football is played today was borne out of the mercurial Dutchman.

Sadly, the same cannot be said about music. If a track aims to be evocative then Cruyff's ode to German oompah music, Oei Oei Oei, which, if Google translate is correct, roughly means "Oops Oops Oops" has the feeling of running down the street with your lederhosen around your ankles.