Keylor Navas’ recent photo left fans surprised and dumbfounded. The former Real Madrid goalkeeper, who is now plying his trade at Pumas UNAM in Liga MX, was seen looking visibly older than his age.
The Costa Rica goalkeeper, one of the greatest of his generation, won three consecutive Champions League titles with Real Madrid, and reached the final with Paris Saint Germain in 2019. He is regarded for his commanding leadership in the box and excellent shot-stopping skills, which made him a household name in European football, and earned him a grand legacy as one of Costa Rica’s most decorated players.
However, Father Time is someone you can never ignore, and it looks like the doldrums of aging and growing older, are finally catching up to Navas.
What happened to Navas man 💔 pic.twitter.com/Ac2nLmvDTb
— LBW (@losblancoswrld) October 6, 2025
Although shot in bad lighting, in his recent photo, Navas appears much older than his supposed age of 38. While he is still sporting his now-famous blond haircut, his receding hairline doesn’t do him any favors in the photo. But fans need not worry, Keylor Navas is fit, fine and healthy, and the picture doesn’t align with reality.
Let’s clear out all the misinformation right now.
This photo was taken in one of his press conferences during his very short stint at Newell’s Old Boys in Argentina.
This Instagram post thumbnail should clear up the rumors of his age. He looks much better from this angle. Here is another angle for you to judge.
So yes, while it is definitely true that Keylor Navas is growing older, he is nowhere close to the age that the original photo displayed. Sometimes, bad lighting can trick our cameras to capture people in unflattering angles and make them look worse than they naturally are.
Navas’s recent Instagram post should be the last straw for us to deduce if he is actually aging.
Without doubt, the Costa Rican international seems in fine mettle. While football is a hectic game, with a lot of strain on one’s body, athletes with a healthy diet, proper training regimes and overall low body fat percentage tend to last long on the playing field. Bodies age with time, as that is the law of nature, but there is no reason for us to believe that Navas is unwell or aging anymore than he already is.
Here are a few reactions that fans had to the photo:
“That hairline is outrageous”
Navas’ forehead is quite visible due to his hairline, but his haircut has been the same for years now.
“This is definitely edited”
One fan put a meme saying the same.
“That’s what a year of living in Nottingham will do to a brother”
Typical English humour on display. And they are not wrong, after all, going from the Sunny skies of Madrid and serene temperature of Paris to the typical rainy days of Nottingham can age anyone out!
“Was he on drugs or something, I’m really sad”
While this assumption is presumptious, the image clearly doesn’t do Navas any favours.
“Bro looks like Howard Hamlin from Better Call Saul”.
Well, there are definitely some similarities, almost uncannily.
Patrick Fabian plays the role of Howard Hamlin in the hit series, Better Call Saul, and he looks a bit like Navas.
Keylor Navas is also on the fag end of his illustrious career, after several stints at the top of the European football pyramid, from his younger days at Levante to maturation with Los Blancos, in La Liga, to PSG in Ligue 1 and Nottingham Forest in the Premier League. Let us enjoy the man and respect his journeyman career on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. After a year at Newell’s Old Boys, he now plays for Pumas UNAM in Mexico, and is still performing well despite the setbacks that come with age.
