Gundogan, Aguero, Raphinha among 24 Barca's EPL signings

Leila Mermelstein 9 months ago 27.3k |

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Gundogan becomes Barca's 24th signing from the Premier League. Collage/AFP

Since the creation of the English Premier League in 1992, Barcelona have made good use of it as a source for talent, and across 30 years have plucked no less than 24 big names from England's top flight. Ilkay Gundogan is the latest to join the list of famous faces that includes Raphinha, Sergio Aguero and legend, Thierry Henry.

Barcelona have been an institution of club football for longer than anyone can remember, and they have been able to bring in talent from all around the world. They have made excellent use however of the English Premier League, and since its creation 30 years ago, the Catalans have brought 24 signings from the English top flight.

It's no surprise a club of Barcelona's stature would look to it for talent recruitment, given that the PL is regarded as one of the strongest, if not the strongest, of the domestic football leagues. The first move came from Tottenham Hotspur in 1995 with the signing of Gheorghe Popescu, and five of Barca's last nine signings have all come from English teams (Gundogan, Raphinha, Christensen, Bellerin and Marcos Alonso).

Arsenal tops the table

Of the 24 signings, Arsenal have contributed 10 between 2000 and 2022, the most of any Premier League team:

- Marc Overmars and Emmanuel Petit (2000)
- Giovanni van Bronckhorst (2003)
- Thierry Henry (2007)
- Aleksandr Hleb (2008)
- Cesc Fabregas (2011)
- Alex Song (2012)
- Thomas Vermaelen (2014)
- Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Hector Bellerin (2022)

Manchester City have sent over four, all much more recently:

- Sergio Aguero, Eric Garcia and Ferran Torres (2021)
- Ilkay Gundogan (2023)

The other 'Big Six' clubs make up another nine, with Man United signing over Gerard Pique (2008), Chelsea sending Eithur Gudjohnsen (2006), Andreas Christensen (2022) and Marcos Alonso (2022), Liverpool losing Javier Mascherano (2010), Luis Suarez (2014) and Philippe Countinho (2018), and of course Tottenham starting the whole trend in 1995 with Popescu.

The only player to have not come from the 'Big Six' of English football was Leeds' Raphinha, who joined the Catalans in 2022.