Chris Smalling. From Maidstone United to Fulham to Manchester United.
The footballer's journey: Are there any true rag to riches stories?
- Thread starter steve zizou
- Start date
Henrik Dalsgaard from AaB used to play in the Danish Serie 2 (which is the level I've played my whole senior "career" so far). He transferred straight to AaB in the Danish Superliga (the top tier) as a 19-20 year old and has since played for the Danish U21s as well.
Superligaen
1. Divison
2. Division East/West (Regional from now on)
Danmarksserien 1/2/3
Københavns/Sjællands/Lolland-Falster/Albani/Jyllandsserien (Jyllandsserien is spread out in 4 groups of 8 teams)
Serie 1 (All of the Series are connected to a specific serie from the above tier. So winning your own Serie 1 in Jutland gets you promoted to Jyllandsserien. Usually there are more than one group in each region labelled Serie X. Meaning that the best placed teams might end up in playoffs.)
Serie 2
Serie 3 (End of Lolland-Falsterserien)
Serie 4
Serie 5
Serie 6 (Only under Sjællands/Jyllandsserien)
1. Divison
2. Division East/West (Regional from now on)
Danmarksserien 1/2/3
Københavns/Sjællands/Lolland-Falster/Albani/Jyllandsserien (Jyllandsserien is spread out in 4 groups of 8 teams)
Serie 1 (All of the Series are connected to a specific serie from the above tier. So winning your own Serie 1 in Jutland gets you promoted to Jyllandsserien. Usually there are more than one group in each region labelled Serie X. Meaning that the best placed teams might end up in playoffs.)
Serie 2
Serie 3 (End of Lolland-Falsterserien)
Serie 4
Serie 5
Serie 6 (Only under Sjællands/Jyllandsserien)
http://lesrosbifs.org/grant-holt-norwich-city-striker-and-his-summer-in-singapore/
He even played for what was historically the worst team in the professional Singapore league at the time. This is a league where a geriatic 40 year old was the top scorer for a few years in a row.
Top marks to Grant Holt.
Likewise a case could be made for almost every Brazilian or African. There are literally 1000s of cases of rag to riches. What I wanted to sift out are players who who no one could've predicted them becoming World Class due to them beginning their careers at the low levels. So even though Leon Britton played from L2 to the Premier League, his ceiling was only mid-table (Swansea). Lambert's peak was at Southampton -though impressive in it's own right, it's still not high a peak. Best examples so far are Ribery, Drogba, Ian Wright and that Tocelli guy.
On your Lewandowski point, He didn't start his career at Lech Poznan. I'm not sure if he was in their youth setup, but according to wiki(i know, I know), his 1st club was in Polish 3rd tier. Which is probably lower than UK level conference.
I used to play FM online with this guy when we were 17/18. He should've been training, I should've been studying (drinking), but at least I got Brighton promoted.
virtual obscurity? He was hot property at the time!Jaap Stam has been mentioned already, but it's a great story. He just lived in his hometown called Kampen and played for his local amateur side until he was 20 years old. Joined their first team when he was around 16, played mostly in midfield there, enjoyed drinking a couple of beers after the match, going out on saturday night, he lived with his parents and went to some low-key technical school on his bike everyday.
When he was 20, he got scouted by FC Zwolle, believe he got a trial for their second team and they were in the Dutch second division at that time, probably not paying salary except to first team regulars. Anyway he did well there, year after he got scouted he joined Cambuur, another small club, playing in the Eredivisie however. 2.5 years after that PSV bought him, he was 24 then, and the rest is history. He went from living at home playing for some local side aged 19/20 never expecting to become a professional player, to winning and being voted the best defender of the Champions League six or seven years later.
When he was 20, he got scouted by FC Zwolle, believe he got a trial for their second team and they were in the Dutch second division at that time, probably not paying salary except to first team regulars. Anyway he did well there, year after he got scouted he joined Cambuur, another small club, playing in the Eredivisie however. 2.5 years after that PSV bought him, he was 24 then, and the rest is history. He went from living at home playing for some local side aged 19/20 never expecting to become a professional player, to winning and being voted the best defender of the Champions League six or seven years later.
Luka Modrić.
He was a refugee when he was a kid, needed to flee his home when Serbs occupied it (killed his grandad..), he lived in a hotel in Zadar with his parents who were very poor. There's a story about his dad making him shin pads out of wood but I think it's an urban legend. Started to play for Zadar, then Zdravko Mamić, boss of Dinamo Zagreb, noticed him and brought him to Dinamo. He went to 2 loan spells, to Zrinjski Mostar in a rough Bosnian Premier league, where he was the best player for one season he was there, and then to small Croatian club Inter Zaprešić where he finished 2nd behind Hajduk Split, nearly winning the title.
Then in 2005. he was brought back to Dinamo and the rest is history.
He was a refugee when he was a kid, needed to flee his home when Serbs occupied it (killed his grandad..), he lived in a hotel in Zadar with his parents who were very poor. There's a story about his dad making him shin pads out of wood but I think it's an urban legend. Started to play for Zadar, then Zdravko Mamić, boss of Dinamo Zagreb, noticed him and brought him to Dinamo. He went to 2 loan spells, to Zrinjski Mostar in a rough Bosnian Premier league, where he was the best player for one season he was there, and then to small Croatian club Inter Zaprešić where he finished 2nd behind Hajduk Split, nearly winning the title.
Then in 2005. he was brought back to Dinamo and the rest is history.
I know he started elsewhere, point is he moved young to the best Polish team and then moved young from there to Germany. Nothing inordinary about that.
Santiago Munez
Victor Moses - Born in a Shanti town. Parents were murdered in Nigeria when he was 11, was found in the chaos by his uncle who said 'he was kicking a fly away football attached a piece of rope', Moved to England a week later as an asylum seeker and now plays in the premier league.
Victor Moses - Born in a Shanti town. Parents were murdered in Nigeria when he was 11, was found in the chaos by his uncle who said 'he was kicking a fly away football attached a piece of rope', Moved to England a week later as an asylum seeker and now plays in the premier league.
Klose played at his home club "Blaubach-Diedelkopf" until he reached 20. Then je joined Homburg to play for their second team in league 5.
Ribery is also notable. He played amateur football until 21, supporting himself as a construction worker.
Newly appointed HSV coach Zinnbauer is also worth a mention. He played 3rd leage football until a cartilage injury forced him to quit at age 26. At 22, he had already started a second career as insurance broker and financial consultant.
When he took over HSV as BuLi coach at age 44, he owned the "Unternehmensgruppe Zinnbauer", finacial consultants, which is reported to be worth 70 Mio.
Last edited:
Ribery is surely the craziest story. From academie dropout and construction worker to almost winner of Ballon d'Or.
Dado Prso and Luca Toni fit in here as well.
Dado Prso and Luca Toni fit in here as well.
Bebe.
Hans-Peter Briegel was german youth champion in triple jump and long jump, only started to play on club level age 17.
Paderborns Süleyman Koc is currently on probation off his 3yrs 9mths sentence for armed robbery.
Kaiserslauterns Harry Koch played as amateur at Vestenbergsgreuth until age of 26. (that Vestenbergsgreuth side that kicked Bayern Munich out of the cup in the first round).
Then 'Lautern hired him and he became a club legend. He also was a successful artistic cyclist: http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball/grossbild-152322-129006.html
No but give me 3 years and I'll have gone from Xbox wum on Redcafe to scoring a winner for United in the World Cup final past Madonna in goal if my dream last night is anything to go by.
There is a lot of this refugees stories with the ex-Yugoslawian teams. Mandzukic's family fled to Germany and lived there from the time he was 6 to 10. Subotic's family came to Germany and did not return but went to the US.Luka Modrić.
He was a refugee when he was a kid, needed to flee his home when Serbs occupied it (killed his grandad..), he lived in a hotel in Zadar with his parents who were very poor. There's a story about his dad making him shin pads out of wood but I think it's an urban legend. Started to play for Zadar, then Zdravko Mamić, boss of Dinamo Zagreb, noticed him and brought him to Dinamo. He went to 2 loan spells, to Zrinjski Mostar in a rough Bosnian Premier league, where he was the best player for one season he was there, and then to small Croatian club Inter Zaprešić where he finished 2nd behind Hajduk Split, nearly winning the title.
Then in 2005. he was brought back to Dinamo and the rest is history.
Brazzo Salihamidzic was about 15 when he was sent to his uncle to Hamburg because of the war.
I think each of the players has a story like this as they grew up in a country in war times.
Yeah, half the Croatian team is from BiH and nearly all of them had to flee from country cause of the war. Some were born in Germany, Switzerland or Australia (Rakitić, N. i R. Kovač, Šimunić) cause their parents needed to leave from Croatia.
Come to think of it even players who were born in Croatia originate from BiH, more accurately Herzegovina cause their parents or grandparents were born there.
The Kovac brothers are born in Germany in the seventies. Nothing special - usual immigrant story. There was a lot of it from different nations. Yugoslavian, Italian, Turkey, Spain. A lot came in the 60s for work and stayed.
Liédson was working in a supermarket in Brazil at 22, he turned out one of the finest strikers in Sporting's recent history, scored for Portugal in the 2010 World Cup, and even got to leave his mark at Porto in his twilight months by assisting our 92nd minute title winner against Benfica two seasons ago. Cracking little player he was.
Last edited:
He's not really there yet, but Depay?
Garry Birtles was a floor tiler playing non league when Peter Taylor took a gamble on him for Nottingham Forest. Scored a goal against Liverpool in the first round of the European cup and won the trophy in successive seasons. Signed for Utd a couple of seasons later. So he went from rags to riches to rags.
One name that hasn't made it up here yet is Andre Hahn, who went from German third division to making an appereance for NT in less than 2 years. (also lingered a lot in lower divisions as well before 2013)
Last edited: