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British footballers playing abroad

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  • C_A_F_C said:

    Paul Lambert won the Champions league with Dortmund and John Collins won the French league with Monaco during the 90's

    And Tony Watt plays in Belgium.
    And Ryan Gauld in Portugal
  • Lloyd Sam and BWP are still going strong In the states.

    Liam Ridgewell is captain of Portland.

    Jack Harrison who left Man utd as a kid to go and play in the US, is now at New York city and was recently called up to England U21's
  • I would love to see more British players giving this a go, especially here in Spain. Why do people on here think British players abroad are such a rarity? Money, the culture, other reasons?

    There are a handful who have done well: Beckham, Lineker, McManaman, Bale to a degree (though he never seems to have fitted into the lifestyle). Then for every one of these there is an Ian Rush, Michael Owen or Ashley Cole, who all didn't last long. Who else has done well and who didn't do much in their stints abroad?

    It would also clearly be good for the national teams, to have players with more experience of playing in different leagues.

    Why doesn't it happen much and will it ever change?

    Can you expand on Bale not fitting I to the lifestyle ... be interested to know what tjat means.
  • edited October 2017

    Lloyd Sam and BWP are still going strong In the states.

    Sam is Plays / played for Ghana (only one though
  • Tony Woodcock played in Germany for quite some time if memory serves me right.
  • LenGlover said:

    Tony Woodcock played in Germany for quite some time if memory serves me right.

    As did Tony Cascarino in France IIRC.

    He certainly wouldn't have struck me at the time as a player that would go on to have a decent career abroad.
  • The redoubtable Chris Dickson was playing in Cyprus for a while.
  • LenGlover said:

    Tony Woodcock played in Germany for quite some time if memory serves me right.

    As did Tony Cascarino in France IIRC.

    He certainly wouldn't have struck me at the time as a player that would go on to have a decent career abroad.
    Yeah for someone who wasn't really that prolific during his career here, he was absolutely lethal in France which was even more surprising considering he was over 30 when he went there.
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  • Len & Bournemouth you're both correct

    The name I've being trying to remember is Joe Baker, never settled in Italy despite a decent scoring record including the winner in a Turin derby. Punching a photographer into a canal and seriously injuring himself driving his car into Garribaldi's statue probably didn't help
  • Even outside the top flights, British players don't seem to go abroad much either. This thread prompted me to have a random look at squads in the second tier of other countries - Spain, Germany, Netherlands. There's a couple of Brits I found that are basically unknown to us. Some clubs have a few non-nationals (like Charlton do) some have several, sometimes concentrated on one particular country - probably indicating a decent scout in that nation. MVV in Holland have only 7 Dutchmen in a squad of 30, but they do have 10 Belgians, who probably commute from their Belgian homes every day.
  • Laurie Cunningham did alright in Spain and France.
  • Wilshere would suit playing abroad. He has technical ability and would be a fresh start for him which is what he needs.
  • why go abroad and earn less than they can (mainly) sitting on their arses at home
  • Lloyd Sam and BWP are still going strong In the states.

    Sam is Plays / played for Ghana (only one though
    Still a British Ghanaian.
  • edited October 2017

    why go abroad and earn less than they can (mainly) sitting on their arses at home

    Well indeed. Why stay and help Charlton into Europe when you can sit on your arse on the Chelsea bench and splash all your wedge in the bookies in Esher...

  • Kap10 said:

    I would love to see more British players giving this a go, especially here in Spain. Why do people on here think British players abroad are such a rarity? Money, the culture, other reasons?

    There are a handful who have done well: Beckham, Lineker, McManaman, Bale to a degree (though he never seems to have fitted into the lifestyle). Then for every one of these there is an Ian Rush, Michael Owen or Ashley Cole, who all didn't last long. Who else has done well and who didn't do much in their stints abroad?

    It would also clearly be good for the national teams, to have players with more experience of playing in different leagues.

    Why doesn't it happen much and will it ever change?

    Can you expand on Bale not fitting I to the lifestyle ... be interested to know what tjat means.
    There just seem to be lots of stories in the Spanish media about him struggling socially with his team mates, mainly due to the language barrier I imagine. He does seem to be a pretty private person though.
  • Owen Hargreaves learnt his trade in Germany and was brought up in Canada bit like Lewis Holtby doing it in Germany as his father was based there in the forces, both were more of a foreign player being imported than a Brit heading out to make their names
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  • Our own Eddie Firmani was a successful early trailblazer in Italy.

    I do realise that he is actually a South African of Italian heritage but he came to the UK and Charlton at 15 or 16 so his football education was British enough.
  • se9addick said:

    There's currently the incredible story of Conor O'Keefe that @CharltonMadrid may have heard of, a young British/Irish goalkeeper who went over to Spain and knocked on doors until he got a chance.

    The team he signed for, Fuenlabrada, are flying high at the top of Segunda Division B and have recently drawn Real Madrid in the Copa del Rey.


    You can follow his progress on his Twitter feed here;

    https://mobile.twitter.com/con_okeefe?lang=en

    Don't think he's broken into the first team yet but what an adventure he must be having.

    Great account of his story here. What a brilliant effort by him.

    https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/nov/28/conor-okeefe-real-madrid-english-goalkeeper-spain-fuenlabrada
  • Vinny Samways had a decent time playing in Spain
  • edited December 2017
    Interesting article about Charlie I'anson, the last Englishman to play in the Spanish top division and now at Granada.

    https://thesetpieces.com/world-football/charlie-ianson-englishman-seeking-another-shot-la-liga-granada/

  • Vinny Samways had a decent time playing in Spain

    He was one of my favourites back in the day.

  • C_A_F_C said:

    Paul Lambert won the Champions league with Dortmund and John Collins won the French league with Monaco during the 90's

    And Tony Watt plays in Belgium.
    And Ryan Gauld in Portugal
    And Chris Dickson played in Cyprus
  • edited December 2017
    Stan Collymore briefly turned up at Real Oviedo. I think Joe Cole did quite well at Lille, and wannabe intellectual Joey Barton made 25 appearances for Marseille, all of which were completely overshadowed by his McClaren-esque tv interview littered with "ow you say"s and a ridiculous French accent.

    Rohan Ricketts has had a fairly dismal football career, but got a lot of stamps on his passport - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohan_Ricketts

    Only just caught up with this thread, very interesting. I think it's a cultural issue. Top Premier League players might be able to claim that Spanish/German/Italian clubs can't match their wages. However, if you're turning out for Stoke, West Brom, Palace, Swansea, surely you could command a comparable wage in La Liga and probably play for a side like who can realistically challenge for a European place.

    We just don't travel well. Incapable of learning new languages and cultures, terrified of eating foreign food, even though it's generally better than ours.

    Shocked at @CharltonMadrid 's earlier post regarding Gareth Bale not being able to conduct an interview. He's been living there for 4 years, he's loaded and only works about 3 or 4 hours a day. Why has he not employed the finest language teacher in Madrid to give him an intensive course?! Should have been competent within 3 months and fluent within a year.
  • MrLargo said:

    Stan Collymore briefly turned up at Real Oviedo. I think Joe Cole did quite well at Lille, and wannabe intellectual Joey Barton made 25 appearances for Marseille, all of which were completed overshadowed by his McClaren-esque tv interview littered with "ow you say"s and a ridiculous French accent.

    Rohan Ricketts has had a fairly dismal football career, but got a lot of stamps on his passport - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohan_Ricketts

    Only just caught up with this thread, very interesting. I think it's a cultural issue. Top Premier League players might be able to claim that Spanish/German/Italian clubs can't match their wages. However, if you're turning out for Stoke, West Brom, Palace, Swansea, surely you could command a comparable wage in La Liga and probably play for a side like who can realistically challenge for a European place.

    We just don't travel well. Incapable of learning new languages and cultures, terrified of eating foreign food, even though it's generally better than hours.

    Shocked at @CharltonMadrid 's earlier post regarding Gareth Bale not being able to conduct an interview. He's been living there for 4 years, he's loaded and only works about 3 or 4 hours a day. Why has he not employed the finest language teacher in Madrid to give him an intensive course?! Should have been competent within 3 months and fluent within a year.

    By contrast Michael Robinson settled in Spain so well, he stayed there and became a football pundit for Spanish TV!
  • Reading Michael Robinson's autobiography at the moment - what he has achieved is fantastic.
  • Another great article about an Englishman abroad, this time in Kazakhstan after a very varied itinerant football journey:

    Korede Aiyegbusi: ‘In Karaganda they only see black people in movies’

    https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/jan/06/kansas-kazakhstan-korede-aiyegbusi-nomadic-career-footballer?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Copy_to_clipboard
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