In the early days of the Premier League – the tournament launched in 1992, the British still had a conservative mindset that it would be difficult for foreign players to play football in England, and vice versa, English players could not play football abroad.

But now half of the teams are made up of players from outside the UK.

Matches with all foreign players like this were rare in the Premier League in its early days.

In 1995, when Middlesbrough, the team often called by the shorter name Boro, had just won a ticket to the Premier League, the club’s leadership agreed that they needed new contracts.

Robson then thought that this approach would help Boro achieve their survival goal with newly promoted teams – not being on the train back to the Championship.

First, Bryan Robson signed two Brazilian players, Juninho and Emerson.

That is the reason why Boro shook European football in the summer of 1996, when they brought Italian striker Fabrizio Ravanelli to Riverside Stadium.

Boro’s recruitment of Juninho (red shirt) helps the British understand that small Brazilian players can play in the Premier League.

This silver-haired striker possesses a mischievous playing style typical of Italian players and is good at finishing with both feet.

Before joining the Premier League, Boro had almost no reputation in English football.

Despite being relegated at the end of the 1996-1997 season, Boro still scored 51 goals, a number that is still a record for a team to finish outside the top 7 of the Premier League.

But as the Guardian commented, Boro’s failed season opened a great and lasting success for football in the poor country with a massive wave of foreign players flooding into the Premier League.

Fabrizio Ravanelli (left) is the inspiration for other Premier League clubs to recruit a series of famous Italian strikers later.

It was the 1996-1997 season that many people considered crazy that helped Boro make their name known to the fans.

Many years later, from the Premier League, the pound has spread all over the world and at the same time turned the number one football tournament in the foggy country into the most attractive playground in the football world.