Has the Crystal Palace Footballer Had a Hair Transplant?
Some new pictures of the England footballer Andros Townsend, who has had such an explosive start to the season with Crystal Palace, suggest that he may have had a hair transplant.
You can see from the pictures on this page that there is a marked difference in the 25-year-old’s hairline. You can read more about his story here:
In the ‘before’ pictures, taken while he was training with England last season, Andros’s hair is receding noticeably around the temples and along the top of his hairline.
Now look at the new pictures of Andros in his Crystal Palace kit at the start of the new season – he has a new shaved ‘crew cut’ and his hairline and temples have been filled in with hair. It looks like his problems with male pattern baldness are over.
So what has been going on with Andros’s hair over the summer break and how has he achieved such a rapid transformation?
Football fans may recall that he was dropped from the England team just before the European Championship in France, so he would have had several weeks off.
Crown Clinic hair transplant surgeon Asim Shahmalak is often asked to review cases like this.
There are two possible explanation.
Andros may have indeed have a hair transplant – almost certainly a Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) procedure like Crown Clinic patient Calum Best and the England football captain Wayne Rooney.
FUE is particularly suitable for men who like to wear their short like Andros because any scars from the harvesting of the donor hair at the back or sides of the scalp are barely visible.
That is why the other main hair transplatation technique, FUT (follicular unit transplantation), or strip harvesting, may not be suitable for Andros because the scars from the strip which would need to be cut from his scalp to obtain the donor hair would be clearly visible with such a short haircut. This method suits men who like to wear their hair a little longer like Crown Clinic patient, TV doctor Christian Jessen.
A more likely explanation for Andros’s hair restoration is a relaitvely new procedure called scalp micropigmentation. This where tiny dots are tattooed on top the top of the scalp to give the impression of a full head of hair.
When applied by a skilled practitioner, these deposits replicate the look of real shaven hair.
Whatever procedure Andros has chosen, he should be congratulated – his hair is terrific and he looks years younger.