Glamorous Aston Villa star Alisha Lehmann beats tennis legend Roger Federer in popularity contest

Retired tennis legend Roger Federer is not used to finishing in second place, but he has been handed an unflattering loss on the social media stage with a little-known football player usurping him at the top.

Along with his 20 Grand Slam singles titles, a career Grand Slam (winning all four Grand Slams at least once) and 103 ATP singles titles including 20 major titles, Federer was also the Swiss king of Instagram.

However, he has now surrendered that title with glamourous Aston Villa star Alisha Lehmann now taking the mantle as the most followed Swiss sports star on the platform.

Not even cutting a striking figure at the Christian Dior Haute Couture Spring Summer 2023 show as part of Paris Fashion Week could help Federer remain top spot on social media

Lehmann plays for Aston Villa and the Switzerland national team and has become the most popular Swiss personality on Instagram, overtaking the grand slam icon

The Aston Villa star also posts a range of glamourous and raunchy photos to her social media

The great Federer has 11.2m followers on the platform while Lehmann has now overtaken him with 11.4m fans.

While there are plenty of images of Lehmann plying her trade in the English FA Women’s National League on her profile, she has something that Federer will never match: a raunchy side.

She has posted bikini photos of herself in glamorous locations around the world like Miami and Rio de Janeiro.

The footballer recently became single after splitting from fellow Aston Villa star Douglas Luiz, and her 2023 calendar has probably helped boost her online profile as well.

Lehmann has notched 32 appearances for Aston Villa and has also played eight games for Everton and 42 matches for West Ham United

Images like this, taken at Miami Beach, have earned Lehmann plenty of praise with one follower commenting: ‘I was looking for the meaning of perfection and I found this’

Lehmann also once dated former Chelsea Women’s star Ramona Bachmann.  

Fellow Swiss tennis stars Stan Wawrinka (1.2 million followers), rising tennis star Belinda Bencic (427k followers) and the retired Martina Hingis (313k Followers) fall well behind Federer and Lehmann.

In other sports Arsenal midfielder Granit Xhaka (2.9 million followers), popular alpine skiing star Marco Odermatt (237K followers), track sprinter Mujinga Kambundji (133K followers) were also well down the pecking order. 

And while Lehmann has dethroned Federer on the Swiss stage, she has work some to do to catch the global Instagram leaders.

Federer has 20 grand slams and signed off from international tennis with a classy letter to his supporters on Instagram (pictured below)

Former Portugal, Manchester United and Real Madrid star Cristiano Ronaldo – who now plays for Saudi Professional League club Al Nassr – tops all athletes with more than 520million followers.

It is one area where he trumps great rival Lionel Messi, who comes in second with 406million – although he does have a World Cup victory to his name.

While technically no longer an athlete, former WWE star Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson is third with 354million followers, with Indian cricket hero Virat Kohli (228million) and Brazillian football star Neymar Jr (197million) rounding out the top five.