Louis CK

Not your typical contender for the hefty mantel of Ginger Adonis, ribald comedian Louis CK is just so goddamn pants-wettingly funny that he get in on the strength of his barbed quips alone. Plus he brings a bit of kitchen sink realism to the manicured marble halls of this pagoda of ging worship, with his rotund waistline, receding hairline, and 'Christ I'm 42, divorced, and with two kids' frownline. Seriously, Louis CK is here to tell the other high kings of ging that in reality, for all your stunning firecrotch pulchritude, life stinks, and you're gonna get fat, bald and die alone - but he does it in such a hilarious way that he is always welcome to the party.

Right: Louis CK. (not pictured, hordes of people rolling about lolling)

Alastair Gray

I'm fully aware that GA is becoming a parade of red hot sporting supernovas, but I was watching the cricket today (yeah, really) and suddenly this magnificent, lumbering carrot-toped carthorse began lurching around the field with the elegance of an erratically steered oil tanker and I was struck dumb. In amidst the preening, bronzed hard bod goms of South Africa and England and their garishly skin-coloured supporters, a pristine unicorn of ging emerged to play the role of Twelfth Man (cricket's fancy name for a substitute), bumbled about the pitch and threw himself heartily into his task to much guffawing from the commentators, in a typical piece of anti-auburn prejudice. But not here; here he found a simpatico, and for his commendable efforts on the pitch, and receding roux pate, Alastair Gray has been elevated to the hallowed crease of Ginger Adonis.

Left: Alastair Gray, all 8 foot 6 of him.

Davide Biondini

You don't know the name, you don't know the face but by gob you know that titian tousled look anywhere. Yes, Davide Biondini (quality name to boot) is the latest athletic auburn footballing maestro, having been just called up to the Italian football squad after putting in some majestic performances for his club Caligari in Sardinia. Imagine it; who would have thought we'd see the day when a ginger Italian was pulling the strings at the heart of the Azzuri's midfield. There must be around four rustynuts in the whole country! In a flurry of typically erudite footballer parlance, Biondini described the call-up as "a dream come true". Forza Biondini!



Right: Davide Biondini, Italian footballer, pointing and looking shocked after spotting one of the three only other ginger Italians in the whole country in the crowd.

Henry Shefflin

Proof that adonises can be humble yet still in possession almost pre-destined greatness, Kilkenny hurler Henry Shefflin bestrides the pitch like a modern day copperknob Cú Chulainn, cutting a swathe through the unfortunate mere mortals who have to mark him and then, after his exertions, he goes home and sorts out finance for New Holland tractor sales in the south-east region including Tipperary, Carlow, Kilkenny, Wexford and Kildare. King Henry, as he has been anointed by his legions of followers, is worthy of Hamlet's effusive praise: "What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god!" Pity he left out 'In hair colour, how ginger'.





Right: Henry Shefflin, winning the prize for best fancy dress for dressing up as 'Henry Shefflin'.

Erlend Øye

Øye-vey! Auburn adonis and pop-polymath Erlend Øye sets the pulses racing of all hipster ladies with his lava-locks and over-sized specs. The Norwegian's nerd chic may have cool cred but his tunes in bands like the Kings of Convenience and the Whitest Boy Alive, alongside his all-singing-all-djing mobile disco act, have garnered him kudos from the all-important muso mafia. Given the plaintive nature of many of his songs and his lovelorn timbre, Øye is clearly a serial heartbreaker who has seen more beds than Ikea (Swedish, i know, but Scandinavia innit?). No doubt he'll be serving up more Norwegian wood to groupies when he tours around Europe with both his bands this summer and autumn.


Left: Erlend Øye, whose glasses are so big he has to duck every time he walks past a 'Loose Chippings' road sign.

Malcolm Middleton

Ginger whinger and former Arab Strap miserabilist misanthrope, Malcolm Middleton is a champion of the meloncholy, sucking the joy out of life with his brooding, bleak yet wryly genius observations of life's general shitness. The notorious stygian ging gloom of Arab Strap's output - courtesy also of beardy bandmate Adrian Moffat - neatly surmised the occasionally fraught aspects of being a carrottop: the sexual frustration, the outsider status, the persecution complex, the urge to get pissed up. In fact Middleton is probably getting pished and not having sex as you read this. Age, and the end of Arab Strap, has not quenched his urge to moan about stuff, and his solo work is a testy testament to the uselessness of getting out of bed every morning. He is foxy and from Falkirk.

Left: Malcolm Middleton, thinking about having a pint and a ride, but will probably only get one of those things.

Dave Kitson

Beanpole scarlet striker Dave Kitson has showcased his immaculately coiffeured orange barnet to the top clubs in the nether regions of the English Premier League, and added a much needed soupcon of ging to the otherwise uniformly bland football horizon. His eye for goal has sadly been poked recently after a lamentable spell at rough-and-tumble neanderthals Stoke City, whose lumpen brand of prehistoric tactics held no truck with the silken skills and finesse of Big Red Kitson. Despite his big money move, he was dolorous at his new home, and quickly returned to Reading, his natural abode. It was here, during a lightening spell of goal poaching, that his bloodshot bouffant came to the attention of England supremo Fabio Capello, who almost, almost, called him into the squad. But he didn't in the end.

Right: Dave Kitson, goading norm-hairs in the stand after scoring a winner and silencing their anti-bronzeballs chanting.