7 Premier League players who’d be on a reality show if they weren’t on the pitch

Any given week can see any Premier League player become a hero … or a villain. This is especially true if you’re Aaron Ramsdale.

In a media appearance with Ellie Collins to play “5 Second Rule,” Declan Rice said his favorite thing about being a footballer is scoring late, late goals. Fair point from Mr. Rice, but do you know what the media likes better than stoppage time heroics? A villain. Just think about how the entire country turned on David Beckham after he was red carded in the 1998 World Cup. Or how Luis Suarez was eviscerated in the press for chewing on Giorgio Chiellini’s arm.

There’s a reason why villains make for great headlines. Villains force you to pick a side, and therefore drive conversation in the fandom.

Reality shows like “The Bachelor” love to cherry pick strong personalities who aren’t necessarily there “for the right reasons,” but who excel at serving up steaming helpings of drama. Case in point: I can’t remember recent winners on the show, but I can tell you all about Jed Wyatt, the guy Hannah Brown picked on Season 15 — and subsequently dumped — after she found out he had a secret girlfriend back at home. But I digress. 

Premier League fans aren’t necessarily tuning in for the villains and the drama, but football has plenty of both.

If their day jobs ever stop working out, here are the players who have the best chance of parlaying their on-the-pitch success into small screen careers. After all, nothing screams second act like a stint on "Bachelor in Paradise!"

Bruno Fernandes

There are divers, there are drama queens, and then there’s Manchester United captain, Bruno Fernandes ... standing alone in a category of his own. Premier League stats imply that he's known for his creative vision and passing ability, but the Internet tells a different story.

Bruno's pageantry is what we in football like to call s**thousery. While going to ground is a time-honored tradition, United's number 8 takes it to the next level.

Couple Bruno's theatrics with the fact he's not always a good sport, and you get a sense of why lots of football fans and pundits don't like him.

In 2023, Manchester United legend Roy Keane told Sky Sports (via Optus) that he felt Bruno didn't deserve the captaincy. "I think he's a talented player, no doubt about it, but what I saw today ... his whinging, his moaning, his throwing his arms up in the air constantly, it really isn't acceptable. ... He's the opposite to what I would want in a captain," Keane said.

To put a more positive spin on it, Bruno has spent his entire football career honing his acting chops, so you know he'll be ready when producers come calling.

Ben White

If this man weren't a stud footballer at Arsenal, he'd be a contestant on "Too Hot to Handle." Where do I start with Benny Blanco ... the finger tats? the earrings? the bucket hats? the random butterfly emoji he uses on Instagram in place of actual captions that must have some significance I'm not aware of?

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Benjamin 🦋 (@benwhite)

A quick browse on Instagram confirms my suspicion that Ben regularly dresses as if he were attending Lollapalooza in Ibiza. Ditto to Mrs. White.

Both of them would not be out of place on a reality show that touts physical "hotness" above all else.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Milly White🦋 (@millywhite)

Another hilarious thing about Benny Blanco is that he doesn't watch football.

In 2023, he admitted to being only vaguely aware of Arsenal football legends. Ben's actual comment was, "I don't know too much about the older generations, but I know (Patrick) Vieira was a very good player. ... I don't know the details," per The Athletic.

Unclear what this has to do with Ben's future on "Too Hot To Handle," except that it somehow aligns with my understanding of Mr. White. Expect to see him in the Turks & Caicos after he quits football. Or maybe look him up in Cali or Vegas as a tattoo artist that exclusively inks dainty little butterflies.

Kyle Walker

This winter, I, along with lots of other people, learned that Manchester City defender Kyle Walker has a second, secret family. In December, Kyle's wife (or ex wife?) Annie Kilner was pregnant with their fourth child when she learned that Kyle had fathered a second child with his on-off mistress Lauryn Goodman.

Annie knew about Kyle's dalliance with Lauryn previously, and forgave him for it. But after Lauryn gave birth to her second child with Kyle, she allegedly FaceTimed Annie (while Kyle was away with Manchester City playing Everton) to tell her the truth.

If you're interested in the full timeline of the Kyle-Lauryn-Annie scandal, The Daily Mail breaks it down for you.

The point of this is not to poke fun at Kyle or Lauryn or Annie, because this is a sad situation with repercussions for innocent kids. It is however, to note that cheating is an unfortunate hallmark of reality TV.

By proxy, Lauryn is kind of a reality star herself. The Sun reports that her younger sister Chloe Goodman appeared on both "Celebrity Big Brother" and MTV's "Ex on the Beach." Ergo, I would not be surprised to one day see Kyle and Lauryn headline a reality show of their own.

I imagine it playing out like "Rob & Chyna."

Emiliano Martinez

If you don't know Emi Martinez — aka Dibu — as the goalkeeper for Aston Villa, you might remember him from the 2022 World Cup. He was kind of a big personality.

Lionel Messi was the hero of Argentina's first World Cup victory since the Diego Maradona days, but it was Dibu's antics during penalty shootouts that kept Argentina alive.

Dibu schooled viewers in the most blatant instance of mind games I've ever seen — holding the ball out to the next shooter, only to throw it away and make them go and get it, revving up the crowd, trash talking, distracting the ref, etc.

Consider this his audition for "Impractical Jokers."

Oh, and also, "So You Think You Can Dance."

Unsurprisingly, Dibu's antics made a lot of people mad, including former player and current pundit Chris Sutton. "I wasn't overly enamored with Martinez's antics in the shootout," Sutton told The Daily Mail. "I thought [throwing the ball away] was a pretty despicable thing to do. I can understand the mind games and heat of the moment you do whatever it takes. But I thought that was totally unnecessary."

Dibu's over-the-top dramatics make him a perfect fit for reality TV. The stuff he says ... you can't script it.

Jack Grealish

I think Manchester City's Jack Grealish already moonlights on "Love Island," actually.

In 2022, Jack liked several of then-contestant Ekin-Su Cülcüloğlu's pics on Instagram. This came on the heels of him publicly admiring pics of reality star Lillie Hayes in a bikini. Oh, and he was also romantically linked to former "Love Islanders" Emily Atack and Amber Gill, despite reportedly being in a long-term relationship with girlfriend Sasha Attwood.

When Jack isn't sliding into random girls' DMs on the 'gram, he's anonymously sending snaps of his calf muscles to @Jack_Grealishs_Legs — which, in case you're wondering, is indeed a real account with over 30K followers.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Purveyor of Jacks legs (@jack_grealishs_legs)

As one of Jack's buddies told The Daily Mail, "We love Jack but just wish he'd spend more time concentrating on his football than he does on social media."

In case the whole football thing doesn't work out, Jack is already planning for his second act. Whether or not he's serious about his DJing aspirations, he already has the perfect stage name picked out in DJ Grealo.

But before DJ Grealo gets in on the music scene, he may want to brush up on his vocabulary ...

... As well as his Chinese speaking skills. What if he was DJing in Beijing?! He should at least know how to say whatever this person is fruitlessly trying to teach him to say.

Neal Maupay

Brentford striker Neal Maupay is that guy on "The Bachelor" who's constantly winding up all the other competitors, finding small but insidious ways to get under their skin. He does the same thing on the pitch.

Exhibit A: Kyle Walker almost did knock him out when Manchester City played Brentford in February. I inferred that Neal did some s**t talking about Kyle's private life, and a lip reader confirmed as much.

Neal also copied James Maddison's trademark beer pong celebration when Brentford played Tottenham at White Hart Lane. This is just rude. Monsieur Maupay, what did Madders ever do to you?

Unsurprisingly, James threw major shade during the post-game conference.

But then Neal took it to the next level with this savage post on Instagram. Since his team lost, it proves ... nothing, except that he just wanted to mess with James.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Neal Maupay (@nealmaupay)

Jesse Palmer, are you paying attention?

Alejandro Garnacho

Spanish-born Alejandro Garnacho has an Argentinian mother. He couldn't decide which country to play for, but blamed both when neither picked him for their respective World Cup sides in 2022.

And OK, Garnacho is only 19, but he's all over the map. First there's the hair and the eyebrows. By itself this is fine, because questionable cuts and grooming decisions are basically a prerequisite for any footballer.

But then, there's also his history of racially insensitive posts, that time he p***ed off Copenhagen in the Champion's League by scuffing up their penalty spot, his idolization of another controversial figure in Cristiano Ronaldo, and the fact he can't remember to track back and mark his man.

Still, he has his moments of entertainment.

Alejandro is fairly new to the Premier League, so the jury's out as to what reality franchise could be the best fit. I just know there's a place for him ~somewhere.