Cristiano Ronaldo, Nicklas Bendtner, Gordon Banks and the Top 10 footballers who survived car crashes

By Mirror Football in Mirror Football Blog

Published 18:19 12/11/09

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MirrorFootball's collective sympathy goes out to Carlo Cudicini today after the Tottenham goalkeeper was injured after crashing his motorbike this morning. But don't worry Carlo, if it's any consolation - which it almost certainly won't be - you're in good company.

Here are 10 other footballers who've seen their insurance premiums go through the roof after crashing their expensive motors.

1) Nicklas Bendtner
The Arsenal striker had a lucky escape when he wrote off his £160,000 Aston Martin in September after crashing while on his way to training. The car ploughed through a fence, hit a tree and came to rest in a field in Hertfordshire but Bendtner walked away with just a couple of cuts and bruises.

2) David Bentley
Bentley's hit the post! Unfortunately not in a football match but rather a lamp post, in his £90,000 Porshe, while over the drink drive limit in August this year. He had previously been banned twice for speeding and in 2007 he told MTV: "I live my life on the edge. I like driving too fast in my Ferrari."

3) Cristiano Ronaldo
Always a show-off, Cristiano Ronaldo destroyed an even more expensive car when he crashed his £200,000 Ferrari 599 GTB in January. The former Manchester United forward was driving through a tunnel near Manchester airport when he hit the barriers and crashed his flash motor. He was not injured though and was back in training later that day.

4) Jermaine Pennant
The former Arsenal winger was arrested in 2005 after driving into a lamp post before driving off, dragging it along with him. When the police stopped him he had his excuses all ready, claiming he was in fact Ashley Cole, his teammate and owner of the Mercedes he was driving. The police disagreed and he was eventually jailed for three months for drink driving.

5) Tony Adams
The former Gunners captain struggled badly with alcoholism in the 1990s and things came to something of a head when he crashed his Ford Sierra into a wall near his house in Southend-on-Sea in 1990. He was four times over the limit and later served two months in prison.

6) Stuart Pearce
In 1998 Pearce narrowly escaped serious injury after a seven tonne lorry overturned and landed on his Rover 200, coming to rest just an inch from his head. He said afterwards: "If the lorry had landed on the car in a different way I would probably be dead now. You could say I'm pleased."

7) Diego Maradona
He's got into just about every other possible scrape you could imagine so it's no surprise the Argentine genius has had a car crash. He was driving his jeep in Cuba in September 2000 when he hit a tourist bus head-on. Could happen to anyone potentially but it was later revealed he had been driving the wrong way down a dual carriageway in total darkness when it happened. Lucky for him he had only bruising to show for it.

8) Chris Coleman
The Coventry manager was still a Fulham player when his £35,000 Jaguar crashed on a country road in Surrey in January 2001. The car spun out of control, smashed through a 4ft-high metal fence on a grass verge at the side of the road before ploughing into a tree. He broke his right leg in the accident and despite a lengthy rehabilitation process he never played first team football again.

9) Gary Charles
The player most famous for a collision with Paul Gascoigne in the 1991 FA Cup Final also had his fair-share of road crashes. He was arrested in 1994 after refusing to give a breath sample following a crash and in 2001 he was at it again, this time he went missing for 24 hours after a minor collision with a red Ford Sierra in Hornchurch High Street, abandoning his £70,000 Mercedes with its lights on and keys in the ignition. Two years later he was finally banned from driving after he drove his sports car into a hedge in a pub car park and fell asleep at the wheel.

10) Gordon Banks
Banks was at the peak of his goalkeeping powers for both England and Stoke in October 1972 when his career was brought to a sudden halt after he crashed his car into a ditch on his way home from training. When he came round he was told he had no life-threatening injuries but had lost the sight in his right eye. He was forced into retirement.

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