Rio Ferdinand has tickled his Instagram following by making an epic gaffe on his latest post.

The 38-year-old football pundit, who is currently dating former Towie star Kate Wright, has been updating his 2.6 million fans with regular workout clips, but made a funny slip-up in today's caption.

Read more

The Manchester United legend is seen doing a gruelling circuit workout in the grounds of his £3m (€3.4m) Essex mansion, where he has a home gym installed, crediting his personal trainer Mel Deane for pushing him the extra mile.

Ferdinand captioned the clip: "4.37am Session with @meldeane12 done this morning... feeling good!! ✔️ #defendertocontender".

Despite the sportsman's undeniable dedication to fitness, fans couldn't help but notice that the timing of Ferdinand's workout didn't quite match up to Britain's dark wintry mornings.

With the rest of us have endured darkness till around 8am every day in recent months, Ferdinand appears to be harbouring all of the sunlight at his place.

Hundreds of followers grilled Ferdinand for the timing error, with one amused follower wrote: "It doesn't look that bright at 4am #Gass", while someone else said: "4am you know. Looks more like 4pm".

A third added: "Why you lying about the time ffs".

While someone else said: "4.37am? You bought a watch off Del Boy mate?"

The aspiring boxer's latest post comes as he dedicated a snap to his girlfriend Ms Wright in an end of year snap after a "dark" 2017.

In a cute couple of the photo, Ferdinand captioned it: "To say 2017 has been a tough year would be a huge understatement. Some dark moments but brightness has been spread around me and mine by this one in many different forms. Christmas being just 1 example, all the thoughtful little details that make things that much better for all of us little throwback pic #visitdubai".

Cheeky night out with this one ❤️ #Rosso

A post shared by Rio Ferdinand (@rioferdy5) on

Ferdinand lost his wife Rebecca Ellison to breast cancer in 2015 at the age of 34, but has now found happiness with Wright, who gave up her TV career to help take care of the star's three children, Lorenz, Tia and Tate.

She told The Sun last year: "I'm taking a step back from the public eye, I want to keep my life private as I lived my previous relationship on Towie, my priority right now is Rio and the family."

A friend also said: "Kate left Towie because she wanted to be away from the limelight. But interest continued to be sky high and she struggled to visit the gym and go on holiday in peace.

"She hopes having no links with brands and no longer being on TV will help give her the quiet life she longs for with her new family."

Rio Ferdinand
Ferdinand to step into the boxing ring; but what is really driving him in there? Getty