With the Premier League's increasingly global reach and its ever-growing popularity in America, it can be interesting to see which clubs have attracted the widest array of famous faces, something especially true with West Ham United. You may be surprised by some of the names on this list and wonder how on earth they even chose the East Londoners as their English team, but often, their reasons aren't too dissimilar from ours.
While you'd usually expect the rich and famous to support teams with a long and illustrious history of winning, like Manchester United, Liverpool or Arsenal, this group has instead pledged their loyalty to the Claret and Blue.
With that said, from professional boxers to actors and even a head of state, we at Football FanCast have taken a look at which celebrities support West Ham.
10 Ray Winstone
Now, there might be a few names on this list that shouldn't really come as a surprise to you at all, and one of those names is none other than British acting legend Ray Winstone.
When he isn't starring opposite some of Hollywood's biggest names, the 66-year-old can be found watching his beloved Hammers. On an episode of the Any Old Irons podcast Winstone explained that his love of the club extends beyond more than just the players on the pitch, saying:
"It’s not just the football but the area where I came from. I’ve got a thing on the wall here that says ‘in our family blood. If I’m on the other side of the world, and I might be in Australia, I remember being in the outback in Australia, and we got English newspapers flown in…you pick up the paper and there it was, the West Ham result.
"Don’t forget that because that’s where you’re made from and that’s everything to me, you know."
9 Lennox Lewis
While Winstone certainly has the credentials to play a hardman on the big screen, legendary boxer Lennox Claudius Lewis is the real deal.
Born 2nd September 1965 in West Ham, London, Lewis would represent Canada as an amateur and at the 1988 Olympics where he would win gold in the super-heavyweight category. Shortly after, he would make his way to professional boxing, where he would go on to have a genuinely unbelievable career, ending it as one of the greatest British fighters of all time.
In total, he had 44 fights, winning 41 – 32 by knockout – losing just twice and fighting out a draw once. He became the WBC heavyweight champion in 1992 and defended the title three times before losing it to Oliver McCall, only to win it back three years later.
Maybe most impressively, he fought with Mike Tyson in 2002 and won, cementing his legacy as one of the true great heavyweights in the modern era.
Outside the ring, Lewis is a massive fan of West Ham, so much so that in 2014, he was welcomed into the dressing room by then-boss Sam Allardyce to give a rousing pre-match speech to the players before they took on Norwich City. Unsurprisingly, the talk worked, and the Hammers emerged as victors.
I mean, you really wouldn't want to let down Lewis, would you?
8 Keira Knightley
Yep, Keira Knightley of Pirates of the Caribbean, Love Actually and Atonement fame is a massive lifelong fan of the Hammers.
In fact, she was one of the celebrities to partake in the Farewell Boleyn campaign that the club ran towards the end of their final year at the famous old ground. She sent in a video proclaiming her love for the stadium and the team, which was shared all over West Ham's official social media channels.
She also did her best to promote the Irons when she went on the American talk show Late Night with Seth Meyers, where she explained the meaning behind the club's anthem 'I'm forever blowing bubbles':
"The problem with the song is that the song is really sad. The song is about not winning and is, in fact, about your dreams fading and dying the whole time, so it's not really a surprise that we lose all the time, when we have this song!"
Well, West Ham's recent European triumph might just have changed her outlook ever so slightly.
7 James Corden
James Corden has become a household name in both the United States and the United Kingdom, and through it all, he has remained a massive West Ham fan.
He shot to fame in the UK for writing and starring in the BBC sitcom Gavin and Stacey, in which he plays the character 'Smithy', who he wrote to also be a die-hard Hammer.
In 2015, Corden succeeded Craig Ferguson as the host of the American talk show 'The Late Late Show' and shot to stardom in the States. Despite being thousands of miles away and in a country not really known for its love of football, he made sure to mention his beloved Irons as frequently as he could on air.
For example, towards the end of last season, he congratulated West Ham's under-18s for their FA Youth Cup win over Arsenal live on air. In June, he was also spotted in Prague for the club's Conference League triumph.
6 Russell Brand
Brand has had a career and personal life full of crazy ups and downs, but through it, his undying love for West Ham has remained. Born in Essex, the comedian come actor has been a fan of the Hammers his entire life and still often goes to watch matches when he's in the country.
He can sometimes be heard phoning into Talksport to discuss the club, most recently to discuss Declan Rice's record-breaking fee. While Rice's exit probably hurt, we're sure the European trophy softened the blow somewhat.
5 Danny Dyer
Okay, this one might be painfully obvious, but can you really make a list of famous West Ham fans and not include the one and only Danny Dyer? Of course you can't.
The quintessential Eastender, and now a regular on Eastenders, Dyer is a lifelong, diehard fan of the Irons who is now a part of the Hammers family courtesy of his daughter having twins with fan favourite winger Jarrod Bowen.
While he might not appreciate some of the new chants, witnessing the father of your grandkids score the winner in a European final for your club probably makes up for it.
4 Dave Grohl
He might be the only musician on the list, but we think being the drummer for Nirvana and the frontman for Foo Fighters probably makes up for that. But why on earth does Dave Grohl support West Ham?
Well, it goes back to the early 2000s when Dave was on an extensive UK tour with his new band Foo Fighters. The legendary drummer explained in an interview with VH1 that he was, and still is, a massive fan of the Premier League, and as he was spending so much time in and around London, he decided to pick the Hammers as his team.
3 Alfred Hitchcock
Arguably one of the greatest filmmakers of all time and one of the most influential people in cinema history, when Hitchcock wasn't working on another cinematic masterpiece, he was thinking about his beloved West Ham.
The Psycho director was a lifelong supporter of the club, born in Leytonstone, only about an hour's walk from Upton Park in East London. It's said that when he lived and worked in Los Angeles, he would get English newspapers delivered to his home every week to keep tabs on his Irons.
During his lifetime, he would've seen the club win multiple FA Cups, a UEFA Cup Winners Cup, and the Second Division title. Unfortunately he would pass away just before the club won a second Second Division title in the 1980/81 season.
2 Matt Damon
When you think of big Hollywood A-listers, it probably isn't long before you cast your mind to the Academy Award-winning Matt Damon. The Massachusetts-born 52-year-old has been nominated for 94 awards in his career, won 27 and, most importantly, is a self-confessed West Ham fan.
Damon's love of the Hammers grew from his time filming Saving Private Ryan in the UK. He explained that he was put off from supporting the then-dominant Manchester United as it was akin to supporting the New York Yankees in baseball – a cardinal sin for a devout Boston Red Sox fan such as himself.
After watching some Leeds United games with a colleague and coming to the conclusion that they were "terrible" – his words, not ours – he landed on West Ham as his new team, a happy medium at the time.
Given the last 12 months, we think he probably made the right choice there.
1 Barack Obama
Yes, you read that right, the 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama is in fact a West Ham fan, and therefore he surely has to be the most famous one of the lot, surely.
While it may seem highly improbable that a man who was once the most powerful individual on the planet is an Iron, it's true, at the East Londoners have made sure to make the most of this fact as well, wishing him a happy birthday on their official Twitter account in 2016.
Apparently his love of the club comes from a visit he paid to his Kent-based half-sister Auma in 2002. This earth-shattering revelation came from one of his campaign advisors during his 2008 election campaign:
“Obama is a big sports nut and loves his soccer.
“He never really followed it, though, until he was told all about the passion of West Ham fans by some of his English relatives. He’s always keen to find out how his adopted club are getting on.”
Some clubs might be able to boast a famous actor, musician, or filmmaker amongst their fans, but only one can claim Barack Obama as their own.
And there you have it, ten of the most famous West Ham fans around.
It's a pretty impressive list to read, and it's mightily refreshing to see some of the globe's most famous faces opting to support one of the sides outside the traditional 'big six'.
What they say must be true then; West Ham really are massive everywhere they go.
