Now we know the reason for the Man Bun: according to photos flying around the Twittersphere during the latter half of Euro 16, it looks like Real Madrid and Wales legend Gareth Bale is rocking a bald spot.
Pictures and screengrabs of the player with his hair in a ponytail have revealed that the Welsh winger – who was transferred from Tottenham Hotspur to the reigning Champions of Europe for nearly €100m in 2013 – has a significant patch that appears to be getting worse.
It appears that Bale, 27, started having an issue with his hair round about the same time as he started growing out the shorter style that he had at Spurs – but it wasn’t until a La Liga game against Real Sociedad that fans started picking up on his exposure up top.
Use your loaf and ditch the bun
Growing the hair long in order to pull it back to disguise bald patches has been around since the Eighties – at least – but the Man Bun put a whole new twist on it since its advent earlier this decade.
On the face of it, a large, tight none-more-fashionable mass of hair at the top of the head provides excellent coverage, but it isn’t going to be fashionable forever. And as we all know, there’s a trade-off when you pull your hair back: while it can act as a more effective cover for a bald spot, it can also create enough tension to bring on traction alopecia, which makes matters considerably worse.
So, while most football fans are awaiting the beginning of the 2016/17 season, we’re wondering if Gareth is going to follow in the footsteps of Wayne Rooney, before he ends up like Bobby Charlton.
