AN Ealing man has drawn the outline of England and Ealing football legend Peter Crouch, as part of his lockdown running challenge.

Matt Peck who is originally from Norfolk but lives in South Ealing, describes himself as an 'on and off runner' having completed the London Marathon in 2018, but on average only running two or three times a week.

During lockdown however, he has spent a good deal of his free time going on runs.

He told Nub News: "Before the pandemic, when the gyms were open, I'd probably go on runs twice a week, but since the gyms have been shut, I've been running five times a week."

Peck is a member of a running club called Secret London Runs, who have been setting challenges for their members to make their runs more unique and enjoyable.

The challenge Peck was set was to run a route in ode to someone special – be it a friend or relative, or even a celebrity.

Peck, a lifelong Norwich City supporter has been a fan of the 6ft 7ins giant since 2003, when he helped the Canaries secure promotion back to the Premier League.

He said: "Crouchy only played for us for three months or so but he was brilliant and he seems like such an all-round nice bloke, he's loved by everyone, you just can't hate him."

Peck who moved to Ealing seven years ago has fallen in love with the area and over time has learnt about a lot of famous faces that are connected to the 'Queen of the Suburbs.'

As his footballing idol happened to be one of them, Peck decided to complete the challenge in his honour and run a route where he would stop at important locations linked to Peter Crouch.

These included both his primary and secondary schools, North Ealing Primary and Drayton Manor High, his favourite curry house Samrat, along with streets that have similar names to Crouch's family, such as Rose Gardens – Rose being the name of his daughter – and Abbey Road – with Abbey being the name of his wife.

As he started mapping the route however, he realised he could recreate a drawing of the former Liverpool and Tottenham striker's figure.

"Abbey Road is a long road so it worked perfectly for his arm, it just all fell into place really well", he added.

Peck, who works in publishing, managed to complete the 23km/14mile run on Sunday, January 31.

He said: "I thought about tagging Crouchy on Instagram, but I saw he hadn't been active since 2014 so I just let it go and just posted it on my social media pages.

"One of my friends from the gym, Roz, went to school with his sister, Sarah and told her about the challenge.

"Then all of a sudden on Thursday morning (February 4), I'd seen Crouchy had tweeted about it and it all blew up."

The tweet has amassed over 28,000 likes, 800 retweets and 100 comments.

"I was worried people on social media would call me a stalker, but the comments have in the majority been banter", said Peck.

"Someone even said the drawing looks more like Daniel Sturridge and now I can't unsee that.

"I'm just chuffed to bits that Crouchy saw it and replied to my comment, I still can't believe it."

The whole thing also managed to coincide with the ex-footballer's birthday which was a day before the run, on January 30, but Peck swears he didn't know about that and that it just happened to be a perfect coincidence.