5 clubs renowned for fielding foreign players

#4 Napoli

Napoli's squad contains foreign stars like Marek Hamsik

In October 2017’s report on foreign talent in Europe’s various leagues, in terms of clubs from Europe’s ‘big four’ leagues – England, Spain, Italy and Germany – Chelsea stood head and shoulders above the rest when it came to minutes played by foreign talent.

Another Premier League side – Arsenal – were second, and third? Napoli of Italy’s Serie A, who had used foreign players in 82.1% of their minutes to that point in 2017/18.

When you look at their squad, it’s hardly a surprise – their 25-man line-up for 2017/18 contained just five Italian players, with other nationalities in there including Slovakia (Marek Hamsik), Algeria (Faouzi Ghoulam), Poland (Arkadiusz Milik) and Guinea (Amadou Diawara).

Of course, the club have always made use of foreign talent – their first ever Serie A title was won in the 1986/97 season largely thanks to the influence of Argentina’s Diego Maradona, and in the 90’s the likes of Uruguay’s Daniel Fonseca and Colombia’s Freddy Rincon regularly starred for the side.

Earlier in the season, Napoli coach Maurizio Sarri insisted in an interview that the amount of foreign talent in Serie A wasn’t to blame for Italy’s failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup – a suggestion that has been aimed at English sides heavily using foreigners over the years, too.