Sporting Heroes Quotes

When you look at role models, you tend to look at players who have played at the highest level, your Viv Andersons and so on.

No, I grew up admiring people who played ice hockey.

It's good for kids to look up to sporting role models.

Footballers have a great opportunity to be a good example because the kids want to listen to you and be like you in many ways.

When you're young you're influenced by the best teams. So a lot of my favourite cricketers were Australian.

Boxing is a dying sport, really. Years ago, the world heavyweight champion could be said to have reached the highest pinnacle of sport. Even in this country, boxers were heroes. Think of Henry Cooper and Frank Bruno.

My sporting heroes were Ken Jones, Stanley Matthews, and Cliff Morgan.

It's kind of ironic that the two sports with the greatest characters, boxing and horse racing, have both been on the decline. In both cases it's for the lack of a suitable hero.

When I was kid I always wanted to be either the captain of the England cricket team or I wanted to be a river bailiff.

That's one of the magical things about the Olympics, Team GB will have someone challenging in a sport that we've never watched and all of a sudden it'll be the biggest thing ever.

A weak, insecure nation needs sporting heroes, players larger than life on the cricketing field, who can transcend the limitations of their country and team.

Alex Higgins was my hero, so to play in Belfast, at the superb Waterfront Hall, is very special to me.

I was a big fan of Naseem Hamed, and followed him. Ronnie O'Sullivan, Stephen Hendry and I know him well.

When I was growing up, Keane and Sheringham were my idols, and they wore 10. So it was always my dream to wear it.

As a kid, I looked up to Gazza, and to Wayne Rooney because he came through at Everton. Zidane has been one of my favourite players and I was always watching videos of him.

Britain has bred many great explorers, but they seem to get so little coverage compared to soccer and rugby players.

I have kids, so I can understand the image that footballers have. They are fans of some players; I see in their eyes. They admire and try to imitate their gestures, their words, their celebrations. They love Ronaldo and Messi. Since Euro 2016, though, they have no right to pronounce the name of Ronaldo!

There's a lot of guys that I obviously admire. The Gary Paytons, me growing up in Seattle being able to watch him play. Even my peers now, the Patrick Beverleys and the Kawhi Leonards, I admire those guys.

Sports Personality of the Year' is such an iconic sort of programme, I remember when I was playing tennis, wherever I was in the world I would want to be back in Britain for 'Sports Personality of the Year.'

The victory in the 1992 World Cup changed Pakistan cricket. A number of cricketers from that side turned out to be role models and inspiration for the younger generation.

I love the individual characters that cricket produces and, more than most other sports, the unlikely heroes.

Because sports are a religion, it's difficult to imagine a world without the Olympics, and to be sure, they have given us many glorious moments.

Leaving golf aside for the moment, I'd choose Roger Federer as a sporting role model, Muhammad Ali for a sporting and non-sporting role model and Nelson Mandela as a true and lasting inspiration.