Whether it was an off-the-ball confrontation or a meaty 50-50 challenge, the Welshman never backed down. That said, he doesn’t believe himself to be the hardest footballer the UK has ever seen.<\/p>\n
Vinnie Jones Names England Legend Among Hardest Opponents<\/p>\n
![\"VinnieJones\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/vinniejones.jpg\"\/)
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In an interview with talkSPORT, the now 61-year-old was quizzed on other notorious hardmen that he played against during his time in England. Jones was tasked with deciding if he would win in a ‘tough-off’ with each name.<\/p>\n
Only three of the suggested names made it out as winners against ‘The Axe’. First was Chelsea legend Dennis Wise. The combative midfielder was a member of the ‘Crazy Gang’, just like Jones. When his name popped up, Jones responded:<\/p>\n
“No. He’s a dirty little b*****d.”<\/p>\n
Joining Wise on the list of players Jones admits were tougher than him was England<\/a> legend Stuart Pearce. Being nicknamed ‘psycho’ leaves little to the imagination, although Jones is adamant he’s not scared of the ex-West Ham defender: “I’m not scared of him, but he was a tough boy.”<\/p>\n Finally, there was absolutely no hesitation from the ex-Wales international when he heard Mick Harford’s name. The pair played together at Wimbledon, meaning Jones knew first-hand how terrifying the striker could be. He immediately said: “No. Monster. He was the monster. The geezer.”<\/p>\n Another player who can back that up is Martin Keown. The Arsenal<\/a> hero was left with significant damage after a collision with Harford, as he’s since explained:<\/p>\n \u201cHis favourite trick was to come from side on and smash you with his forearm. I had to have a nerve taken out of my teeth because he hit me so hard.\u201d<\/p>\n Vinnie Jones Doesn’t Rate Roy Keane as a Hardman<\/p>\n Among the names he swept aside and backed himself against were ex-Liverpool ace Neil Ruddock, Everton bruiser Duncan Ferguson and Manchester United<\/a> icon Roy Keane.<\/p>\n The latter is often spoken about as a scary proposition for any opponent he came up against. However, Jones laughed off the suggestion that the seven-time Premier League winner was harder than him: “That’s an easy one.”<\/p>\n It’s not the first time the midfield general-turned-actor has questioned Keane’s<\/a> hardman persona. He even once named Bryan Robson, Steve McMahon and Billy Whitehurst as tougher footballers<\/a> than the Irishman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Vinnie Jones might be a big-time Hollywood actor these days, but the retired footballer gained a reputation as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-434812","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Cristiano](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/mixcollage-01-oct-2024-09-33-am-7523.jpg\"\/)
\n Cristiano Ronaldo and Roy Keane<\/p>\n