Feature | Vale's overseas players

15th January 2025

With International Fans Day just around the corner on Saturday 18th January, we're taking a look back at our overseas players from years gone by, with the Valiants represented by players from 51 different countries altogether.

Aside from the numerous players from England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, there are 89 players from 46 different overseas countries who have worn Vale colours. Some of them are English-born though, like Robbie Earle, who was capped by Jamaica seven years after leaving the Vale, so it may be arguable whether or not he is classed as ‘overseas’, but for this list he is as he has represented an overseas country. A player’s football nationality is where he was born unless called up by a different country.

The same criteria befitted Chris Birchall, born in Stone, but because his mother was born in Trinidad whilst her parents were on holiday, he qualified to play for them, even though he had never been to Trinidad, and he became their first white player for over 60 years. He scored an important goal for them in the final World Cup qualifiers for 2006 and played for them in the finals in Germany, one game which was against England. He is still the only player to play in the World Cup Finals whilst being on the Vale’s books at the time. He is also our most capped player, winning 26 caps and scoring 25 goals.

South African Ken Fish was the first overseas born player to appear for the Vale, being signed from Aston Villa in November 1937. He made six appearances, scoring one goal before being sold to Young Boys of Berne in Switzerland, but he returned in 1939 and had many years as a successful trainer during our glory days of the 1950s.

The first player the Vale signed from an overseas club was Dutchman Robin Van der Laan in 1991, for £80,000. He was a superb midfielder, making over 200 appearances and scoring over 27 goals including a memorable winner at Stoke City in the Autoglass Trophy in 1993. Robin was sold to Derby County for £475,000 plus striker Lee Mills in 1995. He still lives locally, having been involved with Newcastle Town for a number of years.

Former Vale manager John Rudge had good connections with the Dutch market in the 1990s, culminating in nine players from the Netherlands wearing a Vale shirt, three of them being more recent, but that is the country we have had the most overseas representatives from, followed by France with seven.

Can you name your best side from the overseas contingent? Send in yours using #PVFC on social media.

The full overseas list is:

Albania – Freddie Veseli

Antigua & Barbuda – Rhys Browne

Australia – Chris Herd

Austria – Andrea Lipa

Barbados - Krystian Pearce

Belgium – Florent Cuvelier, Funso Ojo

Brazil – Lucas Covolan

Bulgaria – Dimitar Evtimov

Cameroon – Simon Pierre Mvondo (known as Atangana), Guy Madjo, Andre Bikey

Canada – Randy Samuel, Jayson Leutwiler

Colombia – Cristian Montano

Curacao – Rigino Cicilia

Czech Republic – Tomas Holy

Egypt – Sam Morsy

Faroe Islands – Claus Jorgensen

Finland – Ville Viljanen

France – Stephane Pounewatchy, Christophe Horlaville, Dany N’Guessan, Achille Campion, Sebastien Amoros, Quentin Pereira, Anthony De Freitas

Ghana – Enoch Andoh

Grenada – Craig Rocastle

Guadeloupe – Stephane Zubar

Guinea-Bissau – Francisco Da Silva Junior

Holland – Robin Van Der Laan, Marc Snijders, Arjan van Heusden, Rogier Koordes, Jermaine Holwyn, Nico Jalink, Kjell Knops, Calvin Mac-Intosch, Kelle Roos

Italy – Leonardo Fasan

Jamaica – Robbie Earle, Onandi Lowe, Theo Robinson, Mark Marshall, Anthony Grant, Brandon Cover

Jersey – Kurtis Guthrie

Liberia – Alex Nimely

Montserrat – Anthony Griffith

Netherlands Antilles – Tyrone Loran

New Zealand – Chris Killen, Dave Mulligan

Nigeria – Rueben Agboola, George Abbey, Dolapo Olaoye, Akpo Sodje

Norway – Robin Bernsten

Pakistan – Adnam Ahmed

Portugal – Kiko, Miguel Santos, Paulo Tavares, Carlos Saleiro

Romania – Dennis Politic