Europa League winner with Spurs who retired at 27 now has a very different career
A player who won the Europa League with Spurs last season has since retired at the age of 27 - and now lives a very different life.
Goalkeeper Alfie Whiteman joined the club's academy at the age of 10 and spent his entire professional career in north London.
He only played once for the senior side, coming on as a substitute for Joe Hart during a Europa League group stage match in the 2020/21 season.
But Whiteman was a part of the first-team squad under a host of top-class managers, including Antonio Conte, Jose Mourinho and Ange Postecoglou.
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He was registered as part of the Europa League squad last season as a club-trained player, with Spurs having to register four players under that category.
And despite not playing a single minute, the goalkeeper was awarded a winner's medal by the club.
He left Spurs at the end of his contract in June, before retiring from football altogether shortly after turning 27 in October.
The Athletic reported that he had trials in the summer with several clubs in the EFL, and was offered an initial six-month to be the number two goalkeeper at a Championship club but turned it down.
Spurs player starts brand-new full-time career
Whiteman's passions outside of football had already long become apparent to fans, with his film reviews on the popular website Letterboxd gaining him a cult following.
He also began work in creative industries, such as photography, music and acting, alongside his footballing career.
"I guess I always felt a little bit different," he told The Athletic in October 2025 of how he realised he could have a career away from football.
"My team-mates - who I got on well with - called me a hippie. That was their definition.
"But then, when I was 18, I met my ex-girlfriend, who was a model. She was a bit older than me. Her best friend was a director. It just started opening my eyes to what life has to offer.
"So as I was getting a bit older around 18 or 19, I started meeting new people and realising a bit more about myself, and understanding the football bubble, because it's so insular."
Whiteman now works for the production company Somesuch as a director and photographer and, as per his management's official website, is currently taking part in acting classes.
He is also a resident DJ on NTS Radio, a global platform which broadcasts to over 50 countries worldwide from Hackney in east London.
His debut art exhibition, titled 'A Loan', went on display at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on May 1 and will remain there until September 27.
It features photographs and diary entries from his time on loan in Sweden, as well as a 'full-size replica of the lakeside sauna where Whiteman spent so much of his time'.
The exhibition listing reads: "Whiteman's funny, sad, silly, angry, surreal photos capture the mundanity and repetitiveness of life as a professional athlete. But they are also the first steps in Whiteman rejecting the football dream, and realising that there must be more to life than the same routine he'd been stuck in since signing for Spurs as a 10-year-old."
Topics:Ā Tottenham Hotspur
Ryan Smart