Can I play? Between 9th December, when Paolo Rossi died, and 14th December, when Gerard Houllier a donné un coup de pied au seau, the following sporting personalities also died (I don't know if they were heroes, everyone's a hero nowadays, not like the old days when you had to rescue a pregnant nun from a burning muscle car or something):
Ray Perkins (Walter Ray Perkins (November 6, 1941 – December 9, 2020), wide receiver for the University of Alabama and Baltimore Colts, heart failure);
Ray Perkins, coach at Alabama and in the NFL, dies at 79
Alex Olmedo (Alejandro Olmedo Rodríguez (24 March 1936 – 9 December 2020), Peruvian born American tennnis player, International Tennis Hall of Fame, brain cancer);
Alex Olmedo, 1936-2020
Phil Linz (Philip Francis Linz (June 4, 1939 – December 9, 2020), American professional baseball player, New York Yankees (1962–65), Philadelphia Phillies (1966–67), New York Mets (1967–68), Harmonica incident protagonist, old age);
Phil Linz, Unlikely Baseball Celebrity, Is Dead at 81
Raymond Hunter (William Raymond Hunter (3 April 1934 – 9 December 2020), Northern Irish cricketer and rugby union player, old);
The death of Raymond Hunter.
Gordon Forbes (Gordon Forbes (21 February 1934 – 9 December 2020), South African professional tennis player and author, Covid-19);
Remembering Gordon Forbes, Good Player, Great Writer
Osvaldo Filho (Osvaldo Cochrane Filho (29 July 1933 – 9 December 2020), Brazilian water polo player, 1964 Summer Olympics, Covid-19);
https://www.olympedia.org/athletes/53536.
Nemanja Miljković (Nemanja Miljković (17 May 1990 – 10 December 2020), Serbian basketball player, "long and severe illness" (he was young, so not that long, but probably quite severe);
IN MEMORIAM: Nemanja Miljković
Billy DeMars (William Lester DeMars (August 26, 1925 – December 10, 2020), American Major League Baseball shortstop and coach, old);
https://thatballsouttahere.com/2020/...-billy-demars/
Artyom Chernov (Artyom Chernov (April 28, 1982 – December 11, 2020), Russian ice hockey centre, Covid-19);
https://www.dead-people.com/Artyom-Chernov
Jim Burns (James B. Burns (September 21, 1945 – December 11, 2020), American basketball player, ABA and NBA, cause of death unknown);
https://www.chicagotribune.com/polit...rwe-story.html
Motjeka Madisha (Motjeka Madisha (12 January 1995 – 12 December 2020), South African footballer, Mamelodi Sundowns, car crash and subsequent fire);
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-55264150
Escurinho (Benedito Custódio Ferreira (3 July 1930 – 12 December 2020), Brazilian footballer, multiple organ failure);
https://globoesporte.globo.com/futeb...lo-clube.ghtml
Bird Averitt (William Rodney Averitt (July 22, 1952 – December 12, 2020), American basketball player, ABA and NBA, I'm not allowed to know anything because of stupid EEC privacy laws, but maybe you can open the link);
https://www.wdrb.com/sports/william-...092b28bf0.html
Shahid Mahmood (شاہد محمود (March 1939 – 13 December 2020), Pakistani Test cricketer, cause of death unknown, but old);
https://www.dawn.com/news/1595688
Jimmy Collins (James Earl Collins (November 24, 1946 – December 13, 2020), American basketball player, described on Wikipedia as University of Illinois basketball program's "all-time winningest coach", you can't make this shit up, cause of death unknown because I can't be bothered to find out);
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_...s_(basketball)
Otto Barić, (Otto Barić (19 June 1933 – 13 December 2020), Croatian football player and manager, Covid-19)
https://www.de24.news/en/2020/12/ott...age-of-87.html
Elbrus Abbasov (Elbrus Abbasov ? 1950 – 14 December 2020), Azerbaijani footballer, oh sod this, you're boring me now, I must go....