My favourite in this regard is Moritz Volz (Of Fulham). His page is simply desifned, easy to navigate and he seems to be one of the footballers with his own opinions rather than bland corporate-speak.

Another would be Valencia goalie Timo Hildebrand whose newly designed web-page is now available in German, English and Spanish, a consideration I would dearly like other players I love playing in foreign leagues to show.

My favourites however are always injured Real defender Cristoph Metzelder and his Borussia Dortmund midfielder best-mate Sebastian Kehl, who used their blogs to extemporize on the state of German football, theft of bubblegums, pranks, Goethe’s poetry, handball, tennis and snooker competitions and each other’s injuries… a steady stream of banter and mischief which possibly couldn’t be written by a ghost writer. Sadly, after Metze went to MAdrid and Kehli (Metze’s nickname for Kehl) became a father, the updates are few and far between. I miss them.

Oh, Hugo Lloris and Ederson of Nice also have very nice websites and often upload vids of themselves to youtube.

There you go, the more unknown you are, the more genuine your efforts to be in touch with your fans will be, the ghost of brand-equity being proportionately less menacing.

Hahahaha! I’ve thought exactly the same thing!