Former Real Madrid and Wales  soccer star Gareth Bale announced  his retirement from playing in  January this year, at the age of 33.

The final club of Bale’s career was  MLS franchise Los Angeles FC -  a team the forward helped to win its first ever league championship.

His nine-year spell at LaLiga giants Madrid had come to an unhappy end. In his final season in the Spanish capital, he barely played for Los Blancos.

Bale’s love of golf was a regular  bone of contention in Spain, not least when he posed with a flag reading: “Wales. Golf. Madrid. In that order.”.

Soon after he announced he was hanging up his soccer cleats,  Bale took part in a PGA Tour pro-am golf event - and played well.

And he’s swapped soccer for golf in the world of video games, too. The creators of PGA Tour 2K23 have now made  him a playable character in the sim.

PGA Tour 2k23 will also include  a special course designed by  the five-time Champions League winner, called the Elevens Club.

The news of Bale’s inclusion in the game has attracted huge attention  on social media in recent days.

This will be the first year in well over a decade that Bale, who also played  for Southampton and Tottenham Hotspur, is absent from soccer sims.

So if you haven’t yet had your fill of  the ‘Cardiff Express’ in the video game universe, you’ll need to follow  in his footsteps and switch to golf.