#3 A league without borders
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Arsene Wenger’s first Arsenal XI was filled with 10 Englishmen and the only foreign player in that team was French player Patrick Vieira. After joining Arsenal, the new manager established a robust scouting system in place. Back then, most English teams consisted of majorly English players and the league did not have an influx of foreign players.
However, Wenger’s appointment changed that significantly. Arsenal soon started investing in foreign-born talent and the returns were great. Wenger realised that the foreign football scene had a lot of players who were extremely talented but had gone unnoticed.
Most of these players also did not have a high transfer price since there was no demand for them. The low cost and the bundle of talent that these guys got in increasingly influenced how other teams indulged in their transfers as well.
In 2005, Wenger became the first manager to field a starting XI which did not consist of a single English player, although he was also criticised heavily for this.
