Wenger - The ‘specificity’ of players

Arsene Wenger says he can usually tell the nationality of a player within 30 minutes of watching them play.

The Arsenal manager has brought players from all around the world to the Premier League since his arrival at the club in 1996.

He believes that nations tend to produce players with certain characteristics, which he can detect just from seeing them in action.

“Most of the time, yes [I can tell where they are from],” Wenger told Arsenal Player. “There’s specificity.

“In Spain they are good passers with good technique, in Germany they have good mobility and efficient technique and in England they have a good fighting spirit.

“The emphasis is on defending well in Italy - they are well known for defending well and doing a lot of tactical work at the youth level in training.

“I don’t know why goalkeepers are so good in Poland but usually these Eastern European countries do a lot of gymnastics at a young age to develop flexibility and awareness of your body. Maybe when they go into goalkeeping they benefit from it.

“[These specific characteristics] tend to go away a little bit as the world is more of a unit now and everything is more uniform - you have the same kind of qualities everywhere and that was not the case before.”