5 clubs renowned for fielding foreign players

#3 Arsenal

Wenger's reign at Arsenal saw him buy plenty of foreign talent, including current star Aubamenayng

Like their London rivals Chelsea, rewind back to the early 1990’s and Arsenal were renowned for having a very British spine of players – from their formidable defence that featured the likes of Tony Adams and Steve Bould, through to an attack spearheaded by the legendary Ian Wright.

That all changed with the arrival of French manager Arsene Wenger – the club’s first non-British boss - in 1996.

Not only did Wenger change the face of the club with regards to training methods, nutrition and fitness, but he also began to bring a steady flow of foreign talent to Highbury and eventually the Emirates.

Initially, he brought in fellow Frenchmen like Patrick Vieira, Nicolas Anelka and Emmanuel Petit, but within a handful of seasons, Arsenal was a destination for players from countries as diverse as Sweden (Fredrik Ljungberg), Nigeria (Nwankwo Kanu) Ukraine (Oleg Luzhny) and Togo (Emmanuel Adebayor).

February 2005 was a watershed moment in particular – Arsenal became the first English club to field not only an all-foreign XI (which Chelsea had done years previously) but an all-foreign squad, with even the substitutes coming from overseas.

Today, Arsenal’s biggest names – Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Alexandre Lacazette and Mesut Ozil – all hail from abroad, and in October 2017 it was revealed that foreign players had played in 84.1% of Arsenal’s Premier League minutes at that point in the season – the second-highest in the Premier League.