In 1977, Kevin Keagan signed for Hamburg SV on a 3 year deal, making 90 appearances for the club and scoring 32 goals. A few years later, after being the first player to be sold between English clubs; in 1982; Trevor Francis joined Italian side Sampdoria for four years. He then joined Atalanta for another year, making it 5 years in Italy. This started a slight trend in England and Britain's top players to move abroad. Back then, not many British players moved abroad to play football. It wasn't like it is now where the English Premier League is brimming with overseas talent. 126 nations have featured in the Premier League since 1992/93 season.
You don't see many average English players going to play abroad. It's as if it is the "crème de la crème" of the British talent that gets noticed across the boarders and the rest don't exist. It seems like the views haven't changed since back in the 80's too. In 1986, Gary Lineker joined Barcelona on a 3 year deal until 1989. He is one of England's all time top goal scorers and maybe in a list of top 10 England players ever. Winning Golden Boots and goal scoring records, Lineker shone for Tottenham Hotspurs and Everton in England's First Division. At the same time, Mark Hughes also played for Barcelona. He was slightly less fortunate and not played as much as Lineker and moved out on loan to Bayern Munich for a season. There use to be a rule that you were only allowed 3 foreign players in your team at a time. The Premier League use to have a similar rule about non-European players too. This has since changed and now you can have as many as you like from where ever.
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Towards the end of his career, Lineker joined Japanese side Nagoya Grampus. In today's game this could be likened to players joining the MLS, The Chinese Super League or The Saudi Pro League. Going for a bit of extra retirement cash or to grow the game in that part of the world. I agree these days you don't really grow the game with the odd player joining a team in a country that doesn't have massive exposure to the top players in the world. Even though Lineker would have got a much better deal from the Japanese side than any team in Europe for his last two years in the game, I do believe he went there to try and grow the game in Japan. It could have been like what China were trying to do around 2015-2020 and it just never took off.
The MLS may have done this in America and was almost started by David Beckham. Building a platform to promote the game and make it what it is today with other super stars joining more recently. Without Beckham going there 20 years ago, I don't think you would see players like Zlatan Ibrahimovic going to The States to play, or even more recently Lionel Messi joining Inter Miami. It's all publicity stunts and the athletes get a nice pay out. That's the positive side of it.
Maybe it is for another blog to get into the ins and outs of players and countries developing the infrastructure of the game in smaller footballing nations around the world. I've digressed. Back to it.
A few players did this in the 80's and earlier but not many. It always seemed to be the best British players such as; Laurie Cunningham, David Platt, Peter Beardsley, Graeme Souness and Chris Waddle. All internationals for their country and playing at the top teams in English League Football. Glenn Hoddle was another. He joined AS Monaco in 1987 until 1991 after playing at Spurs for 12 years. He made almost 400 appearances for the North London club, was recognised as one of the best English players of his generation and then moved abroad. It is only the top players that get recognised? It's not all the best players that go, but seems to be the players that go are one of the best at the time.
Things have never really changed. Entering the 90's and the age of the Premier League, still not many British players go to play abroad.
I think the first British player to leave the newly invented Premier League was Paul Gascoigne. Again, he was one of the best British players of that time. For a while he must have been the first player on the team sheet for England and he was recognised abroad. Gazza joined Lazio in 1992 for 3 years, before he returned to Britain to join Glasgow Rangers.
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Before I continue, can you imagine being a Lazio player being told that an English player is coming to join their dressing room and it's Paul Gascoigne that shows up. Some of his team mates have incredible stories about what he would get up to, with the pranks and crazy jokes he would do on a regular basis. Imagine the Italians in that dressing room who are dead set professionals. He must have blown them away silly.
The Modern Era
Since the turn of the millennium, a few British players have gone abroad. In 2004 Michael Owen joined Real Madrid from Liverpool. Owen was one of the best English strikers of his generation and was becoming England's set number 9. He was slightly hampered with injuries from playing so many games at such a young age and maybe the better thing for him to do for his career would have been to stay at Liverpool or at least in England. However, the pull of giants like Real Madrid is a strong one. I'm pretty sure Owen has absolutely no regents on joining the Spanish giants. How can any player at the top turn down such an opportunity. When he went there he was jostling for position with the likes of Raul and Ronaldo. Not bad company is it. He knew this and with his injuries, surely it would have been better for him to be playing regularly rather than sometimes in the team and sometimes out of the team. He didn't get the game time he was use to and only lasted one year in the Spanish capital before moving back to England.
Weirdly the same thing happened with Jonathan Woodgate. After playing for the two giants in the North East; Newcastle United and the mighty Leeds United; he joined Real Madrid on a 3 year deal. Similarly to Owen, the defender was also becoming hampered with niggling injuries. What didn't help was his debut for Real Madrid was met with an own goal followed by a red card; all in the first half of the game. Between 2004 and 2007 Woodgate only made 8 more appearances before returning to England, firstly on loan but then joined his hometown club Middlesborough on a permanent deal.
In 2012/13 season, Gareth Bale won the PFA Player of the Year and PFA Young Player of the Year Awards. After Cristiano Ronaldo, he was only the second player in the history of the awards to win both awards in the same year. This caught leverage and he caught the attention of the Spanish giants too. In 2013, the Welshman joined for a record breaking £85.1 million (over 100 million Euros) to form the impressive; BBC Bale, Benzema, Cristiano Ronaldo; forward line. The trio went on to break goal scoring records for Los Blanco's and won many trophies.
A few years later, after winning the La Liga title, The Champions League and the Spanish Super Cup, Bale was ostracised and questioned about his work ethic. One rule he broke after joining a Spanish side was not learning the language as is tradition. Players are given the exception for their first season in the country and after that, in press conferences, they are expected to listen and speak in Spanish. The winger was found to be playing more golf than football at the time, and in an international game posed for photos with a fans flag that read "Golf, Football, Madrid. In that order." While captaining his nation Wales. Things got very sour after that between the player and the club fans and he was never really accepted back.
If you went off these examples, you wouldn't really think hard about why not many British player go to play abroad. Going back to the 80's not many of our best talents had success abroad. With these examples since the birth of the Premier League, not many of the best players in their generations had success abroad. Yet there are some success stories.
Another top English player, Harry Kane has gone abroad to Bayern Munich. The happiest person about this is Alan Shearer. It makes his Premier League goal scoring record a bit harder to break as Kane looked sure to break his record before leaving the Premier League. In all honesty, I think Kane has gone there because Daniel Levy wouldn't sell Kane to another Premier League club cheaply or easily. I think the current England captain will spend a few years abroad and then come back to give himself a few more years at trying to break Shearer's record of 260 Premier League goals.
David Beckham
Golden balls gets a whole section to himself when it comes to talking about British player who have played abroad. It's a whole life journey, what he has done abroad in football is more than a lot of players do playing in their own country, in Britain or overseas.
After 11 years at Old Trafford and over 250 games, Becks joined the Spanish giants Real Madrid. He said after finishing his career he never wanted to leave Manchester United, yet I bet he didn't complain too much once he'd got to Madrid. He was joining a side nicknames "The Galactico's" due to the star studded squad Madrid had at the time. Roberto Carlos, Zinedine Zidane, Raul, Iker Casillas, Ronaldo, Luis Figo, the list goes on and on.
With his reputation of a global superstar, being married to a Spice Girl, and now joining Real Madrid he was definitely setting his status as one of the most famous and recognisable people in every corner of the planet. In his first season in the Spanish capital he won the UEFA Supercup. This looked like it was going to be a very successful, trophy heavy time in Spain. However, the next silver wear he won in Madrid was in his last season when they won the La Liga title in 2007.
In 2012, Beckham exited Real Madrid and joined LA Galaxy in the American MLS. At first this looked like a massive mistake. The MLS back then wasn't what it is today. The pitches football was played on was similar to grass roots football in England, the stadiums weren't up to scratch like they are in NFL or baseball in the USA and the teams were the standard of the fourth division in England.
During his time in America, Becks made a few loan spells back into European football as the league schedules would not overlap. The former England captain joined AC Milan on loan for two spells in 2009 and 2010.
At the end of his 5 seasons in the MLS, he joined PSG for one last season. His body was obviously not keeping up with the playing schedule and it was time to end his memorable career.
As we can all see how, Beckham had a plan that none of us realised. He made sure that he would be able to create his own franchise in the MLS. Creating Inter Miami was always the plan for Beckham. He won't have known it would have been in Miami, Florida, and he won't have known that one day he would be signing Lionel Messi to his team.
This all started with Beckham leaving England and being exposed to a different culture and the way of doing things. It is very easy to say, if he didn't leave Old Trafford, none of this would have happened. Great things can happen from travelling abroad to work.
The Apprenticeships
When Birmingham City retired Jude Bellingham's number 22 shirt in 2020, a lot of people thought they were over reactive. He joined Borussia Dortmund from the midlands club before he had played a top flight game of football. He wasn't a developed player and at the age of 17 his body hadn't quite filled out yet. At £25 million Jude became the most expensive 17 year old in history. He joined a team only behind Bayern Munich in Germany's top league and wasn't exactly joining a small club. He has pressure on him with that price tag as he hadn't really done anything in the game. Only one year in senior football and he was already joining the German giants.
In 3 years at Dortmund, the England international went from being hardly known to one of the first players on the team sheet for his country. The problem really was where is he going to play in the team because he's taking someone else's place in the starting line up. Someone with experience and is an establish international. Jude took his place in the side and hasn't looked back, playing important roles for England in European competitions and the World Cup and scored vital goals in the competitions. For Dortmund he played 92 games in 3 seasons, showing that he might have been born in Birmingham but he was made in Dortmund.
Dortmund have shown that they have the recipe to creating young super stars. Including names like Erling Haaland who developed into currently being the games deadliest goal scorers with a domestic and international game to goal ration of 1 in 1.
Do Managers Perform Any Better Abroad?
Gary Neville's Valencia experience isn't a good place to start so I'm not even going to talk about it.
When I think of English managers abroad I first think of Sir Bobby Robson. After managing England from 1982-1990, he managed European clubs; Sporting Lisbon, Porto and Barcelona sandwiched by spells at PSV Eindhoven. It's quite clear that after being targeted by the English media and brandished a "traitor" for not renewing his contract with England that his patience in English football was done. In his first spell at PSV they won the Eredivisie title back to back. Sporting Lisbon is where Sir Bobby met a certain Jose Mourinho. Mourinho was his translator and became his assistant manager when he moved to Lisbon rivals, Porto. At Porto, like at his time in The Netherlands, he also won the league title back to back.
In 1996, 6 years into managing on the continent, the former England manager joined Spanish giants Barcelona, also with Mourinho by his side. One of Robson's first signings in Catalonia was Ronaldo. That season they went on to win the Copa del Rey, Supercopa de Espana and the UEFA Cup Winners Cup. He was voted manager European Manager of the Season 1996-97.
Another English manager to manage Barcelona was Terry Venables. He gained the nickname "El Tel" from the English tabloids. However, El Tel only managed outside of England for two jobs. His first, Barcelona was because he was recommended by Sir Bobby Robson. He had gained a great reputation for the jobs he had done at QPR and Crystal Palace respectively.
In Venables 3 years in Catalonia, he won the 1985/86 La Liga title, Barcelona's first since 1974, he also won the 1986 Copa de la Liga, and got to the final of the European Cup losing on penalties to Steaua Bucuresti.
Managers More Recently
Steve McClaren will be looked down on by most English football fans for the jobs that he did with the English National Team and becoming "The wally with the 'brolly." After working with Middlesborough, Manchester United and England, McClaren joined FC Twente in the Eredivisie. In 2010 won the title ahead of PSV and Ajax and became the first Englishman to win a title outside of Britain since Sir Bobby Robson did it with Porto in 1996. Robson also won the Eredivisie title in 1991 and 1992 with PSV. Just like Terry Venables at Barcelona, Sir Bobby had a big influence in McClaren going to work in The Netherlands.
After winning the title, McClaren moved across the boarder to Germany and joined Wolfsburg. He became the first English manager to manage in the top flight of German football. Things didn't go as well as they did in The Netherlands and he only lasted just under a year before returning to manage in England.
Another England manager to manage abroad was Roy Hodgson. Hodgson had great longevity to his managerial career. He had a great influence on football in Scandinavia. His first managerial role in football was with Swedish team Halmstad. Joining in 1976, he won the league title in 1976 and 1979. To date, this is still one of the biggest surprises in Swedish football. The year before the former England manager joined Halmstad, the team avoided relegation by goal difference. The very next season, he's got them winning the league. Leicester City eat your heart out, right.
After dipping back into English football, in 1982 Hodgson moved back to Sweden and had spells with two second division teams; Oddevold and Orebro. There wasn't much success before he moved to the bigger Swedish side Malmo. Malmo won 5 consecutive league titles along with two Swedish Cups between 1985 and 1991. He was offered a lifetime contract but declined.
After making such an influence in Swedish football, Hodgson moved to Switzerland. He joined Neuchatel Xamax. In his time in swiss domestic football he took his team all the way to the UEFA Cup in 1992, where they beat Celtic over two legs and won their home game in the next round against Real Madrid. This caused waves in Swiss football and he was giving the position of Men's Swiss National Team manager.
Hodgson took them to their first major international tournament since the 1966 World Cup. They qualified top of their group that included top national teams such as; Italy and Portugal. In the finals they finished second in group A, progressing to the knock out stages. He did the same again for the Swiss national side and got them qualified for the 1996 World Cup and resigned once they were qualified.
Once his job was done and the Swiss were qualified for the World Cup once again under his reign, he joined Italian giants Inter Milan. Hodgson spent two years in Italy and by Inter fans will always be known as the manager who sold Brazilian legend Roberto Carlos. At the time Inter were a struggling league team yet did well in cup competitions. He led them to the UEFA Cup final in 1997, where they played Schalke. Back then even the final was played over two legs. Both sides won their home games 1-0 before the Italians were beaten on penalties. Yes, the Germans won on penalties. Shock!
Hodgson has a list as long as your arm of teams he has managed outside of The British Isles. Including clubs teams; Swiss side Grasshoppers, Copenhagen, Udinese and Norwegian side Viking. He's also managed national sides; UAE and Finland before given the England job. What a career and I've only mentioned outside of English football.
Alan Pardew spent 4 months at Dutch side ADO Den Haag and 6 months at Greek side Aris Thessaloniki. Sounds a bit like he did the G.Nev at Valencia twice.
In 2010, Graham Potter joined Ostersund who at the time were in the fourth division of Swedish football. He took them to consecutive promotions and won their third promotion in 4 season in 2015. He had taken them from fourth division to first division in 4 seasons and pushed on to enter the group stage round of the UEFA Europa League. Despite beating Arsenal 2-1 in their group they were eliminated on goal difference being level on points with Athletic Bilbao.
In Conclusion
As a player it seemed like you needed to be a top British international to be recognised by a European club. Unless you played at the very top and strived there you didn't go abroad to play. More recently I still think this is the case with most players. Only the best will go and play for the giants of Europe like Real Madrid, Barcelona or Bayern Munich. Recently, some players such as Fikayo Tomori, Tammy Abraham, Chris Smalling or Scott McTominay have gone and played abroad yet I feel that is because the teams they played for did not want to sell them to rival clubs or teams in the same division as them.
It seems to be similar circumstances with managers. Only the managers who have credentials of working at the best domestic clubs in England or even the Men's National Team manager role are noticed by clubs to go work in the European leagues.
I think young players, if given the option, should jump at the chance of playing abroad. We have seen from experience that the playing time as a teenager or young player is higher compared to players who play for teams in the Premier League. The type of coaching they are exposed to seems a lot more technical too, which develops players into the system based football a lot of teams play in today's game.
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