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The transfer market database has gained another milestone. The Premier League International Cup is now almost completely available. This is a tournament for U23 teams that was held for the first time in the 2014/15 season. The cup is part of the “Elite Player Performance Plan”, a Premier League youth development program that is primarily intended to train young players from top English clubs.
U23 teams from Premier League clubs meet youth teams from other European clubs. So far, teams from the Netherlands, Portugal, Croatia, Spain, France, Scotland, Czech Republic, Denmark, Belgium, Italy, Poland and Germany have taken part.
In the final of the 2014/15 season, the then 18-year-old striker Kelechi Iheanacho made the Manchester City team the first winner of the competition with his goal to make it 1-0 against FC Porto. However, this was followed by a long dry spell for the representatives of the Premier League. It wasn’t until 2023/24 that an English team, Crystal Palace, was able to win the tournament again (1-0 against PSV Eindhoven).
With FC Bayern Munich 2018/19 and Borussia Dortmund, who were recently crowned current champions in May with a win against Real Madrid, two German clubs also immortalized themselves in the winners’ list. Taycan Etcibasi scored the decisive goal for BVB in the final, while Kwasi Wriedt and Meritan Shabani scored for FC Bayern in the 2019 final to make it 2-0 against Dinamo Zagreb.
Premier League International Cup: PSV Eindhoven most frequent participant
The most common participant is not an English club, but one from the Netherlands. PSV Eindhoven has competed in every season so far, with the exception of the 2020/21 and 2021/22 seasons, in which the competition was not played at all due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
So far, no team from Germany has been there more often than Hertha BSC. The Old Lady competed seven times, but only made it past the group stage in their first season in 2016/17. Tony Fuchs and Veit Stange, who took part in the tournament with both Hertha and Borussia Mönchengladbach, have made 15 appearances each, more than any other German player.
The youngest player to appear in the Premier League International Cup so far is Anhá Cande. The FC Porto center forward made his debut against Wolverhampton Wanderers in 2022 at the age of 15 years, three months and six days. Cande was therefore around a month younger than Makenzie Bradbury in 2022 and Kennet Eichhorn in 2024, who was then used by Hertha at 15 years, four months and 13 days.
At the other end of the scale is England’s former international Ashley Young. The defender played for Everton FC in January 2024 at the age of 38 years, six months and 15 days, making him the oldest professional to appear on the pitch in this competition.
Despite intensive research, two lineups from the 2014/15 season are unfortunately still missing. It is the FC Schalke 04 team from the game against Benfica and Borussia Mönchengladbach against FC Porto. If you have further information about this – or about another game – or you notice an error, please use the correction forms in the respective game report. They are available to every registered user of Transfermarkt. You can find short instructions for data maintenance here.