What Happened to Gareth Bale Lookalike Who Played For Tottenham

· GiveMeSport

What happened to ex-Tottenham youngster everyone mistakenly thought was Gareth Bale

Footballer lookalikes are nothing new. After all, how many times have you been told that you looked like a player? Perhaps, sometimes, even a Premier League star.

Yet, even though doppelganger comparisons are part and parcel of the sporting world, nobody could quite believe their eyes when they saw just how much one former Tottenham player looked like Real Madrid and Wales legend Gareth Bale .

There may not be a better like-for-like lookalike in the beautiful game's history than Kenny McEvoy, whose story is made all the more compelling by the fact that he was an unknown quantity in the north London side's academy, before making the step up to senior level just a year after Bale left the club.

Now, 13 years on from the Irishman being an unused substitute in Tottenham's Europa League group-stage match against Tromso, McEvoy's whereabouts have come to light, and it's safe to say he didn't exactly follow in Bale's footsteps.

Everything from his hair, eyebrows, and nose to the way his cheekbone and jaw is shaped in a certain way that makes it impossible not to recognise, McEvoy was the perfect Bale lookalike. In a recent social media post, one X user was keen to bring up this comparison again, more than a decade on. They wrote (see the full post below) :

> "It's still mental to me that this bloke wasn't Gareth Bale."

They both played on the wing, they were both celebrated for their pace, and they both played for Tottenham at around the same time. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to ask whether anyone had ever seen them in the same room, just to make sure they weren't one and the same person.

Not much differentiates McEvoy from Bale. Height is one thing, considering he is 5ft 9in while Bale is 6ft 1in, and the latter is five years older. Oh, and then there's the small matter of their respective success in football - a yawning chasm that separates the two - but McEvoy can still hold his own when it comes to the fact he is still playing today.

While Gareth Bale went on to reach the very top of the game - lifting five Champions League titles with Real Madrid - McEvoy's career took a very different route.

The Waterford native had initially looked every inch the promising young winger at Tottenham, making his mark for the club's youth sides. During the 2011/12 season, he scored eight goals in 22 appearances for the Under-18s and appeared to be one to watch for the future. But, as is so often the case in football, the road to the top is rarely a straight one.

McEvoy continued to show plenty of promise in the seasons that followed, but a string of loan spells at Peterborough United, Colchester United, Stevenage and York City ultimately failed to pave the way for a senior breakthrough at Tottenham. Instead, after never making a first-team appearance for the Lilywhites, he joined York City on a permanent basis in 2016.

His stay at York, however, proved to be short-lived. The club were relegated to League Two the following season, and McEvoy was shown the door when his contract expired at the end of the campaign. Rather than hang up his boots, McEvoy dropped down the football pyramid and joined East Midlands Counties League side South Normanton Athletic.

His performances soon put him back on the radar, with a move to his native Ireland on the cards. Waterford and Sligo Rovers were both reportedly keen, but it was his hometown club who won the race for his signature, with McEvoy joining League of Ireland First Division side Waterford on 25 January 2017.

His time back in England wasn't over just yet, though. McEvoy later re-signed for South Normanton Athletic, by then competing in the Midland League Premier Division, as his career continued to take him down a road few could have predicted when he was turning heads in Tottenham's academy.

At international level, McEvoy also pulled on the green shirt, representing the Republic of Ireland at Under-17, Under-19 and Under-21 level.

Read the original

Related