Adama Traore is one of English football’s most physically imposing players, with the Fulham winger with his size, strength and speed serving up a unique challenge for even the Premier League’s best full-backs to contend with.
The 29-year-old has played more 300 games in English football since leaving Barcelona for Aston Villa in a £7million move in 2015 in a career that has taken in stints at Middlesbrough and Wolves before he joined the Cottagers in the summer of 2023.
While Traore began his career as a somewhat scrawny winger, he now has the build of a sprinter or NFL linebacker, but has previously claimed he does not partake in any weightlifting to maintain his physique.
Robinson spills the beans on Traore's gym work
In 2018, the eight-time Spain international who is valued at €10million bt Transfermarkt told Marca that: "I train every day with my physical coach, people ask if I do weights or on social media they ask if I take something or what I do, but I don't, it's just prevention and physical work, I don't do work to get muscle because I get muscle really quickly.
"No, I haven't lifted a single weight,” he insisted. “I know people won't believe it, but it's true."
Traore therefore probably won’t be too impressed to hear what his Fulham teammate Antonee Robinson said on a recent appearance on Ben Foster’s Fozcast, where he gave a contradictory account of the Spaniard’s gym exploits.
"Is this from the rumours where he's saying, 'I don't ever do gym’?,” Robinson asked. “It's a big lie! He's always in the gym.
"Anyone with any sense, you can see the size of him but I remember thinking that and wondering what he was like. The first thing I said was, 'Where you looking to live?' and he was like, 'I was going to live here but there's not enough space for the gym to go in the house'.
"He's a unit. He's 5ft 8 or 5ft 9 or something and he's about 90kg."
Robinson was also asked if Traore still applies baby oil to himself before games so that he can slip away from opponents.
"I don't think he does it anymore," the USA international continued. "I think he stopped that. He had a physio at Barca and Wolves who would do it for him and our physios like, 'Nah'."
