Gunnar Nielsen Premier league The career was brief.
Extremely short, in fact: it lasted 17 minutes. The goalkeeper was presented as a late substitute for Manchester City against Arsenal In 2010, after Shay gave had aggravated a shoulder injury, he resumed a week earlier during the dive in vain for the late winner of Paul Scholes at the Manchester Derby.
But it was a big problem at home. These 17 minutes represented the first – and only – from time to a player from the Faroe Islands had played in the Premier League. It was so serious that a local radio station could not even wait until the game finished calling his brother for a reaction. Fortunately, Nielsen kept a white sheet, avoiding the resolutely embarrassing perspective that his brother had to offer a live comment on an embarrassing error.
“It was so nervous that he couldn’t say a word,” said Nielsen now. “He just gave the phone to my sister-in-law.”
Nielsen is part of a small unusual players’ club, a group that was recently joined by New City Signing Abdukodir KhusanovThe defender of Uzbekistan: there are two of the 18 men to be the only players in their respective countries to make an appearance in the Premier League.
Neilsen made his only appearance in the Premier League in April 2010 (Neil Tingle – PA Images via Getty Images)
So, as you can imagine, it was quite a big news in the Faroes when Nielsen appeared. The cover of television and radio was a fact, but its 15 minutes of almost literal glory were the speech of the city. “I spoke to a bouncer in a nightclub that I knew,” explains Nielsen. “He said that the only thing everyone talked about this Saturday evening was how I appeared in the Premier League.
“It was such a great thing when it happened. I remember that people send me photos and send me sms and called me – to this day, I meet people who always say that they remember when they were at this precise moment when I came. »»
Khusanov is the second player to join the club this season, after City of Ipswich striker Ali Al-Hamadi became the first Iraqi to decorate the division when he came in the opening match of the season against Liverpool.
For the sake of exhaustiveness, the others are: Victor Wanyama (Kenya), Henrikh Mkhitaryan (Armenia), Onel Hernandez (Cuba), Firpo Junior (Dominican Republic), Nathaniel Mendez-Laing (Guatemala), Danny Higginbotham (Gibraltar), Ryan Donk (Suriname), Ali al-Habsi (Oman), Jordi Amat (Indonesia), Hamza Choudhury (Bangladesh), Dylan Kerr (Malta), Mbwana Samatta (Tanzania), Frédéric Nimani (Central African Republic), Neil Etherridge (Philippines) and Zesh Rehman (Pakistan).
By definition, the nations of this list are not traditional football powers. Some players had a slight lightness, since they were born and grew up in larger or more recognizable football environments, but played for another country due to a family bond. Amat, Choudhury, Rehman, Etherridge, Hernandez, Firpo, Mendez-Laing, Higginbotham and Donk enter this category.
But some of the others grew up in an environment where there were simply no models to show them the way to one of the great leagues in Europe. They are pioneers.
“You have to see someone who did it before,” said Nielsen Athletics. “We are closely connected to Denmark, so you look at the players from there, but (not having an example from Farois) has not made things easier. There had been no one in the Premier League of the Faroe Islands, and even if there were young players who had been under the contract of young people in certain Premier League clubs, there was no one to admire in this direction. “”
Wanyama also had no compatriot to show him the way to the Premier League, but he was lucky because he, at least, had more immediate role models, like his brother, McDonald Mariga, who joined Parma Serie A When Wanyama was 16 years old. Before that, Wanyama followed Mariga in Helsingborgs in Sweden, briefly returning home when the older brother went to Italy, before properly starting his European trip with Beerschot, Belgium. It also did not hurt that his father, Noah, played and causing the AFC Leopards leopards, based in Nairobi.
Wanyama plays for Tottenham in 2019 (Shaun Botterill / Getty Images)
“I grew up in a football family,” said Wanyama Athletics. “I used to watch the Premier League – I grew up watching these matches. When I was 11, I already dreamed of being there one day. I loved Roy Keane and Paul Scholes.
“My father was a coach, my brother played: it was something very deep. It was in our blood. I wanted to play on the biggest scene. I knew that the Premier League was the most difficult league in the world. I knew it would be difficult to enter, which motivated me. »»
The situation of Etherridge was slightly different. Born and raised in England, the goalkeeper qualified to play for the Philippines through his mother. He would go to the Philippines by growing up quite regularly, but, for various reasons, has not returned for years. Then, at 18, his former teammates in the Chélat Philippine youth and international team James and Phil Younghusband also suggested it for a place in the team. He made his debut in 2008, recorded more than 80 caps and was appointed captain of the national team in 2022.
Neil Etheridge in action for cardiff against Manchester City in 2019 (Oli Scarff / AFP)
“I just felt a link with the country and people,” said Etherridge from Thailand, where he plays now. “The Philippines are an extremely proud country. Culture and blood are going through you. I was only 18 years old, but I saw a chance to make a change in a country which is not necessarily oriented towards football. Basketball is number 1. At the time, football was not really a sport that was recognized. »»
He is not kidding. They sank in the 195th in the world when Etherridge was called for the first time, and had little or no recording in international competition. Their highest ranking during the years of 111 intermediaries may not seem brilliant, but they qualified for the Asian Cup for the first time in 2019 and went to the second qualification round for the 2014 World Cup , once again the first time that the team has left so far.
Etherridge achieved most of this before playing in the Premier League for the first time, which ended up doing it in 2017 after winning the promotion with Cardiff. “It was a massive matter,” he said. “Although it is not as tall as if a Philippin played in the NbaAnd Manny Pacquiao is the country’s n ° 1 of the country by a country mile. I was probably more recognized as the first Southeast Asian player to play in the Premier League, rather than the first Philippin.
“I was able to do a lot first. In 2010, we reached the semi-finals of the Southeast Asian Cup (AF CUP) for the first time and it was then that football exploded in the Philippines. Even now, 15 years later, he is still on stage, but it is something that I am proud to be part, to put football on the country map. »»
National identity can be a slightly complicated, non -binary and sometimes fluid thing, so it is worth offering certain parameters: players are defined as their country in particular if they were born and n ‘ have not represented another country, or if they have represented this country at the full international level.
There are certain curiosities on the list. The Premier League has seen several players born in Suriname and who represent the Netherlands (Regi Blinker, Edgar Davids, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink), but Donk, the only player to represent the Suriname, was born in the Netherlands.
Some on the list were not classified as coming from their respective nations while playing in the Premier League. Higginbotham played a few games for Gibraltar, but they were long after his Southampton/ /Sunderland/ /City of Stoke pump. The beginnings of Mendez-Lin for Guatemala came when he was in Ligue 1 with DerbyA few years after his high flight days with Cardiff.
Danny Higginbotham in his play days for Stoke City in 2010 (images Mike Egerton / PA via Getty Images)
Then there are the gray areas, like the former midfielder of Brighton & Hove Albion, Mahmoud Dahoud, who is counted on certain lists as the only representative of Syria. He was born in Syria and grew up in Germany, for whom he played two friendly games in 2020, he was thus considered German in England. However, in 2024, he changed allegiance to the nation of his birth and was called to the Syria team … only to withdraw before playing. He can always represent them in the future, but we do not count it for the moment.
Then there is an equatorial Guinea. Emilio Nsue, who was born and grew up in Spain and made four appearances for Middlesbrough In the Premier League, played 45 times for Equatorial Guinea between 2013 and 2024 and won the Golden Boot at the 2023 African Cup of Nations. However, it may not count, as in 2024 Fifa Judged that it had been ineligible all the time.
In 2013, the Equatoguine Football Federation asked their Spanish counterparts for NSUE to change their nationality (he had made several competitions for various teams of young Spanish), but at the very least, there were irregularities with the process. They failed two qualification games from the 2014 World Cup due to NSUE’s ineligibility, but they continued to choose it anyway, and did it at various intervals during the following decade. It really seems that FIFA has only noticed it because of its heroic to the Afcon, how much they have declared its whole international career zero and not avenue.
So … does he count? Do we enter into a bizarre and metaphysical field by acting as if the international appearances of NSUE have literally ever occurred, rather than administratively? If this is the case Pedro Obiang, the only other international from Equatorial Guinea, becomes the 19th individual on this list. But for the moment, we will go with tangible reality and the credit of Equatorial Guinea with two Premier League players.
Of course, the Premier League is not the pinnacle for everyone. This is not necessarily the case on which each player slept Barclays The sheets and their only desire as a child was to play in England.
Take Wanyama, for example. “It was a more important matter to play Celtic“He says,” because it was the team I grew up while supporting. Especially in the Glasgow derby. »»
For most of these players, playing in the Premier League was a source of personal pride, but hope is that they can be the inspiration and the model they did not have when they were younger.
“Without wanting to blow up my own trumpet,” explains Etherridge, “if it was not for me and the success I had, there would be a lot of football players who would not have had a career in the game . Our national team. There are many people in the world who have decided to play for the Philippines because they now know what the Philippines national team is. »»
Wanyama adds: “I am proud if I made young players dream, to believe in themselves that they could play in the Premier League one day. Now everyone wants to be there, and they know that the door is open to them. They believe they can do it too.
(Top Photos: Getty Images)