For example, Bert Trautmann, the first foreign Footballer of the Year, in 1956, qualified via residency after being captured as a POW. Other foreign stars, like Sweden's Hans Jeppson at Charlton, had short, glorious stints in England on amateur terms then went elsewhere to earn a living. The effect was that English clubs were not allowed to buy off-the-peg foreign professionals. The only way around the rules was to play for nothing, or live in England doing another job before becoming a pro. Arsenal's only concession to the authorities was that Keizer was given an amateur contract, not a professional one. In other words, he played without pay, hoping not to provoke those who were against foreign professionals.Instead, Sutcliffe and his FA colleagues were so enraged that at the next AGM of the FA, in the summer of 1931, they changed the rules of the FA. The pivotal clause, approved by the FA Council on 1 June 1931, read: "A professional player who is not a British-born subject is not eligible to take part in any competition under the jurisdiction of this Association unless he possesses a two-year residential qualification within the jurisdiction of the Association."In other words, foreign professionals were banned from England.

Charles Sutcliffe, a powerful FA official who later became president of the League, made his own stance (and the FA's) resoundingly clear in his column in the Topical Times newspaper in August 1930.He wrote: "The idea of bringing foreigners to play in league football is repulsive to the clubs, offensive to British players and a terrible confession of weakness in the management of a club."The FA, the PFA and the Ministry of Labour then made a formal agreement that they were opposed to foreign professionals, although they stopped short of legislation just then.Arsenal were unbowed, and hired a different foreign player who was already resident in England ­ Keizer, a Dutch international goalkeeper. That episode began when Arsenal's manager, Herbert Chapman, agreed a deal to sign an Austrian goalkeeper, Rudy Hiden, from Vienna. Hiden never made it past immigration at Dover because the players' union and the Football League had implored the Ministry of Labour to deny him a work permit on the grounds that he would be taking the job of a British worker. Indeed, in 1930, their stubbornness in the face of resistance from the authorities led to a nationwide 47-year ban on importing foreign professionals being imposed by the Football Association.

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That was Accrington in 1892, when Walter Bowman, a Canadian international of Swiss heritage, made his debut. But the Gunners have been among the leaders in the import business since the early 1990s, when the likes of Anders Limpar and John Jensen arrived as part of a Scandinavian influx.They have also blooded a number of notable foreign "firsts", including the first Dutchman in the League (Gerry Keizer, in 1930), the first Icelander (Albert Gudmundsson, 1946), the first player born in Senegal (Frenchman Patrick Vieira, 1996), and the first Liberian (Christopher Wreh, 1997).But arguably of greatest significance to the story of England's foreign footballers, Arsenal have a record of breaking taboos and railing against an often xenophobic establishment in the search for multinational talent. "It will be a bad day for club managers when they have to cultivate team spirit in a team of players where some would not understand a word said to them." - Charles Sutcliffe, leading Football League official, FA councillor and anti-foreigner campaigner, 1930. Yet given Arsenal's long, rich and often controversial involvement with foreign players, it is appropriate that they should be first to reach the "ultimate imports" landmark, with a foreign manager selecting a starting line-up of 11 foreign players and a bench of five foreign substitutes. (Chelsea fielded the first all-foreign XI in England in 1999 but had four Britons on the bench). They have four English players on the bench.2005 Arsenal, under Frenchman Wenger, become the first club in League history to field an all-foreign squad with 16 non-British players.Nick Harris.