The English Premier League has attracted players from all over the world – except Africa, it seems. Mike Ticher looks at the reasons why
You might be forgiven for thinking after the last few seasons that no country in the world was safe from the all-seeing eyes of desperate English football clubs. With Brazilians at Bradford and Bulgarians at Reading, it seemed no club was too modest nor any nationality too exotic to be persuaded of each other’s merits.
West Brom fan Jaz Baines puts the case for his club making more of an effort to recruit players from ethnic minority backgrounds
According to the PFA about one in five professional footballers in the Premiership and Nationwide League are black. To judge by the latest Rothmans, fifteen clubs had no black players on their books last season. Black players will always come and go, of course, and there may be other mitigating circumstances, not least the fact that clubs situated in areas like Yorkshire & Humberside and Tyne & Wear, where the black population is 0.7 per cent and 0.2 per cent respectively, are less likely to recruit black players than clubs in London or the Midlands. However, while the presence of the likes of Tranmere, York, Grimsby and Hartlepool on this list is no surprise, the inclusion of West Bromwich Albion ought to raise a few eyebrows.
Osasu Obayiuwana surveys some of the pitfalls that lie in wait for African players hoping to pursue careers in Europe
Top quality African players are appearing in Europe in increasing numbers but amongst all the success stories, like George Weah and Finidi George, are just as many tales of hardship, of players whose naïvete on financial issues has been taken advantage of by rapacious clubs or business managers.