What do Jimmy Greaves, Ray Wilkins, David Beckham, Paul Gascoigne and Kyle Walker have in common? They all made more than 50 appearances for England as well as playing for Italian clubs. While they are household names, the first Englishman to represent an Italian club is less familiar.
The former soldier Charles Adcock moved to Padova just after the second world war having been spotted playing for the British army. By a strange quirk of fate Adcock never played league football in his own country. After spending a handful of years in Italy, in 1953 he returned to England, where he played for Peterborough United, at the time a non-league side.
In the 80 years after Adcock’s move, more than 50 English players have played in Serie A. There are more English players with Italian clubs this season than ever before. Of the 21 British players with Italian clubs, the majority are English, led by internationals such as John Stones and Djed Spence who moved to Inter after the World Cup.
So, why the sudden influx of players from England? There was a wave of high-profile English players in Serie A in the 1980s, such as the first £1m player, Trevor Francis, who joined Sampdoria in 1982. He came up against Mark Hateley and Wilkins, who both spent three seasons at Milan in the mid-1980s.
Gascoigne was the big English star in Italy in the 1990s and he was joined by journeymen such as Franz Carr and Danny Dichio. At any time throughout those two decades, only a handful of Englishmen played in Serie A compared with the 15 who are now with Italian clubs. The fortunes of those English émigrés were followed by fans back home on Gazzetta Football Italia, hosted by James Richardson.
Nowadays, the main coverage of Serie A is on TNT, headed up by commentator Adam Summerton. Someone like Liam Henderson, who’s been in Italy since 2018. Chris Smalling was another in 2019.” Smalling spent five years at Roma and was the player of the match when they won the inaugural Conference League final in 2022 under José Mourinho.
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