#5 Jamie Vardy
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From playing in front of a crowd of 2,500 in a non-league side to lifting the English Premier League trophy, Jamie Vardy’s underdog story is definitely worth a big screen adaptation. The 30-year-old’s journey to the top is nothing less than an intriguing tale of rags to riches.
Born in a working-class family in Sheffield, Vardy’s hopes of playing professional football for his local club, Sheffield Wednesday were dashed after the club let go of him at the age of 16. This, however, turned out to be a major point in his career.
Vardy took the rejection headstrong and started working on a 12-hour shift in a carbon-fibre splint factory while earning less than one could hope for in order to survive. It was a tough period for a 16-year-old who had to work young as he found a new perspective on life. But there was also an opportunity to play football once again as the job led him to play for the Stocksbridge Park Steels Football Club for seven years earning £30 a week.
Things were looking up for Vardy until a grim night outside a pub in 2007 where the forward was convicted for assault after supposedly defending one of his friends from a beat down. The Englishman was assigned to probation where he had to wear a probation tag for six months along with a curfew of 6 pm.
Despite all the restriction, Vardy still managed to impress the scouts who came to watch him play which eventually lead him to Halifax followed by Fleetwood and finally ending up at Leicester City in 2012 after being signed by the Foxes for £1.5 million.
From there on, things changed drastically for the Englishman as he featured regularly for the club and helped them earn promotion to the Premier League in 2014. After surviving relegation by the skin of their teeth in 2014/15, Vardy achieved the unthinkable with the Foxes as he went on to lift the Premier League trophy last season while scoring 24 goals and breaking Ruud Van Nistelrooy’s record of consecutive Premier League games with a goal.
