Whether from leading by example, or rousing team-mates with inspirational words, these five captains helped to elevate their teams to extraordinary heights.
Leaders of men, they were a credit to the armband.
5) Steven Gerrard
A league title may have always deserted Gerrard’s Liverpool but a clutch of domestic trophies and a famous Champions League triumph is a bountiful return for a side that experienced as many troughs as peaks throughout his 17 years at Anfield.
His all-action midfielding and dedication to the cause ensured that standards never dipped from those around him and it’s hard to keep count of the times he pulled his side out of the mire courtesy of a spectacular long-ranger. Few players have thrown the live betting markets into chaos more from 25 yards out.
A local boy made very good, Gerrard was the Reds’ heart and soul for a generation.
4) Vincent Kompany
With just 18 top-flight goals to his name across 11 seasons there was never a danger of Kompany featuring in the Premier League top scorer odds, nor should he have. Manchester City’s defensive colossus typically only ventured forward for set-pieces.
But if the number is scant, the importance of a couple of them in particular are monumental, each time altering the course of a Premier League title race, tilting it in City’s favour.
A thumping header in a must-win Manchester derby in April 2012 set up Sergio Aguero’s unforgettable last-gasp strike a fortnight later.
Against Leicester in the penultimate game of the 2018/19 season, City simply had to win but couldn’t find the breakthrough. That was until Kompany strode into space and unleashed a Roy of the Rovers effort right into the top corner.
There was infinitely more of course to the Belgian as a player, man and leader than simply these goals. But they alone warrant his statue outside the Etihad stadium.
3) Tony Adams
Chiselled from old-school values, but then transformed as a renaissance man, Adams’ remarkable career took in league titles, alcoholism, over 500 appearances for his beloved Arsenal, and a nation first labelling him a donkey, before lauding him as a lion. There was even two months of jail-time.
Handed the captaincy in 1988, aged just 21, Adams first embodied the gritty Gunners of the George Graham era then became the founding rock on which Arsene Wenger built a decade and more of beautiful, successful football.
He was a man for all seasons and a captain others wilfully followed into battle.
2) Roy Keane
In 14 seasons as Manchester United’s skipper, and several years either side, Keane was the personification of Sir Alex Ferguson’s ferocious drive and ambition. They were a dream team and acknowledging this makes their subsequent fall-out all the more regrettable.
There is an irony too in how their relationship soured, the combative Irishman being overly critical of team-mates in an interview for MUTV.
To that point, Keane’s biggest strength as a leader had always been the impossibly high levels he demanded from colleagues, sniffing out any semblance of complacency and quashing it with a few curt words and that stare.
It was an insistence on excellence that heralded seven league titles, four as captain.
1) John Terry
No player has captained their side to more league titles than ‘Mr Chelsea’, Terry’s leadership qualities proving time and again to be an invaluable commodity to an extravagant project that could easily have produced mercenaries and a divided dressing room.
As Roman Abramovich heavily invested in the team, bringing in superstar after superstar, the presence of Terry and Frank Lampard meant Chelsea maintained their identity, a nucleus of passion and pride in the badge that others followed.
From organising team-bonding PlayStation competitions, to putting in countless commanding displays at the back, Terry hauled, cajoled and inspired his boyhood club to greatness.
*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to Alamy*
