Foreigners : the blight on the modern game . Overpriced , overpaid, under talented Johnny foreigner. Pundits and fans alike blame the arrival of these over seas mercenaries for taking away the chances of local talent to the detriment of the Scotland side. These arguments are most probably well founded, although some players such as Brian Laudrup and Henrik Larsson are the other side of the coin. World class talents who excited Scottish crowds and helped youngsters around them flourish by passing on good habits and skills and technique. Morton has always been a cosmopolitan club associated with recruitment of foreign players dating back to the Danish invasion of 1964 instigated by the legendary Hal Stewart. However we as Morton supporters have seen both sides of the coin quality imports and exported duds. This article will now take a look at some of the various success stories and obscure failures.

The trend began with the well documented ‘Danish Invasion’ of the 1960’s. The story goes that Morton played Copenhagen side Broshoj Boldklub on Monday 16th March 1964. Hal Stewart was particularly impressed by their goalkeeper that night, whom the matchday programme lists as 24 year old Arne Nielsen (the team also included future signings Artentoft and Thorup). The Bronshoj manager advised Stewart that the keeper had a one off and that he should sign the international keeper Eric Sorenson. With Danish football being amateur at the time he did so and so the invasion began. Further signings included Kai Johansen, Preben Artentoft, Borge Thorup, Jorn Sorenson, Carl Bertelsen and Per Batram. Interestingly long before the English media tallied up Arsenal’s French contingent to reveal how much of the starting 11 they made up Morton played a game with Hearts in 1966 with no less than 6 Danes in the line-up. The Danes, of which I’m sure there were a few more I have not mentioned, are the great success story in Morton’s foreign recruitment. Sorenson and Johansen went onto play for Glsagow Rangers while Preben Artentoft scored an amazing hat-trick v Celtic. Sorenson also became caretaker manager at Cappielow in 1974. These were before this writers time so please forgive the lack of anecdotes or true detail. The same can be said of the next import. As I am led to believe Morton signed an American goalkeeper in the 1970’s called David(?) Brcic. According to various posts on the Mortonunofficial.net messageboard Brcic was a very highly rated keeper who would have to go down as another success story.

The ‘Ton with Allan McGraw returned to Scandinavia in 1995 to jump-start the faltering Second Division campaign. £250,000 (a club record) was paid to bring Finnish Internationals Janne Lindberg and Marko Rajamaki from MyPa 47. Fondly remembered by younger and older fans alike, the Finns are a definate success. Lindberg was the midfield lynchpin and Rajamaki provided the flair and goals up front or on the wing. These two were the catalyst for the Second Division win in 94-95 and the assault on the First Division the following season. A particular favourite of mine was when we were trailing Airdrieonians 1-0 when both players scored, one on 84 minutes and one on 86 minutes to turn the game around and seal a late, late victory. Rajamaki went on to play with Livingston and Hamilton and gained around 11 caps. Lindberg gained approximately a half-century of caps and even captained the international side while at Morton. In fact Janne is still playing with MyPa and played in European competition last season, a testament to his quality. Along with the Danes these Finns were examples of quality imports.

However around the same time the ‘Ton brought in a foreign dud. Andre Boe was an entertaining dud though. The Goalkeeper came with an impressive reputation , back-up goalkeeper for Cameroon at the 1990 World Cup in Italy. This was a false dawn, Boe’s performances were at best erratic seen by thumpings from St.Johnstone and Dundee United which many attribute to having cost Morton promotion that season. Other major duds included the infamous ‘ three Austrians’ : Marcus Sucalia, Markus Febelmayr and Christian Koell. Sucalia was a centre-half who played half a dozen or so games in 1997, poor at best although he did play a decent game against St.Mirren at Love Street. The other two did not even play a first team game although Koell ( alledgedly a former Austrian u-21 international) can claim to have scored against St.Mirren, well in a reserve game at Cappielow. No sooner had they arrived than they had been shipped back to their native land.

The Hugh Scott/ Mike Peden era brought a few foreigners with mixed results. Canadian international Paul Fenwick was an unbridled success, made all the sweeter as he was a free transfer from the Saints. The tall centre-half who was immense in the air and on the ground was a formidable barrier in defence. Unfortunately he played at the wrong time for Morton. Due to Paul playing for Canada as they WON the Gold Cup he missed Morton games, Hugh Scott did not want to pay wages to an absent player so he was consequently released after having to join the ‘Ton fans in the stand at Starks Park. Paul went on loan to Raith and then joined Hibs in the Premier. Morton were reported to have previously rejected a £100,000 bid for Fenwick from Hibs, they eventually got him for nothing, he is still there. Again Hugh showed how astute he was at our clubs helm. A season or so later Allan Evans brought in two Frenchmen : Parfait Medou-Otye and Karim Boukraa. ‘Big Parfait’ was a quality defender who made frequent bustling forays into the opposition box. Unfortunately he moved to Kidderminster and was then rumoured to have retired due to heart problems. I recently heard he is back playing with a non-league team in England. Karim on the other hand was an enigma. Boukraa was an inconsistent winger who moved onto Ross County, where played a blinder against Rangers in the Scottish Cup.
It was also around this time two trialists from the Caribbean island of St.Kitts and Nevis came to Morton. One name escapes me but the other was Austin Huggins who had over 100 caps for his country. As with most things at the time the whole thing was probably to draw attention away from other factors. The closest we got to those two was when they joined us in the stand at The Shyberry Excelsior.

Post- Scott the first foreigner was Angolan Artur Correia formerly of Wimbledon. No wonder they are nicknamed the ‘Crazy Gang’. Correia was not a success and could hardly kick the ball. Not the first-time an Angolan has let the club down remember Jose Quitongo. However DDF Rae did eventually get it right on the foreign front with the arrival of another Finn Jani Uotinen (on Lindberg’s recommendation), another Canadian Emilio Bottiglieri and the Australian Maisano brothers, Marco firstly and then John. There have been a few low key Australians in the past : John Willoughby, goalkeeper Stuart Webster and even the recently departed Lee Robertson however the two brothers look like following the Danes and Finns in being classed as quality imports. The Maisanos are a bit Cosmopolitan themselves Marco being born in Buenos Aires, holding an Italian passport and growing up in Australia. Unfortunately after an excellent start to his time at Morton Uotinen’s career seems to have stalled with manager John McCormack keeping him on the bench most weeks, hopefully he can force his way back in and add his name to the list of successful foreign imports and avoid being labelled a dud. I’m sure I have missed a few foreign stars and duds especially those pre-1990’s (as this is when I started going to games) but from what I have found Morton has had a varied level of success with foreign signings but the majority seem to have excited the Cappielow faithful.

(Other players who turned up as ‘foreign’ in my research included : Zambia born Robert Earnshaw , South Africa born Robbie Raeside, Malta born Dylan Kerr and Jaswinder Juttla [who was one of the only Asians to play in Scottish football but in essence was a Scottish/Indian ]. I decided not to include them as they weren’t really foreigners as they considered themselves to be British nationals)

JonaTon