Photo: Werner100359 via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped. This adapted image is also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Vegan center-back Chris Smalling scored one and set up two more as Roma beat Brescia 3-0 at the Stadio Olimpico on Sunday, November 24. The goal makes him the first Englishman to score twice in a Serie A season since David Beckham for AC Milan in 2008/09, Forza Italian Football reports.
Brescia frustrated Roma for the whole first half. Within three minutes of the restart, Lorenzo Pellegrini's corner found Smalling's head and the ball rolled in off a deflection. He then headed a cross into the path of Gianluca Mancini, who volleyed into the top corner, and nodded another corner down for Edin Dzeko to turn and finish. The win lifts Roma into the Champions League places.
Smalling joined Roma on loan from Manchester United at the end of August and has become a fixture at the back. His first Serie A goal came in last month's 4-0 win at Udinese, the season records show.
He went vegan last year, inspired by his wife Sam, who had been vegan for several years. In a video interview with Sky Sports, quoted by VegNews, he said the change has done wonders for his body:
I can never go back. This is me for life now. Physically, even before I went vegan [when I was] cutting down on red meat, my tendonitis was vastly improved. Then when I went vegan and I don't feel it at all anymore.
For Smalling it is about more than performance. "You find out how brutal [animal agriculture] is to the animals, your own health, and the damages it causes to the environment," he said. "Vegan is the way forward."
We reported last year that Smalling had gone fully vegan while at Manchester United. Football is catching on fast: vegan club Forest Green Rovers became the first certified climate neutral by the UN, and plant-based striker Alex Morgan won the Women's World Cup in the summer.
A defender with Beckham's scoring touch. Powered by plants.