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Robert Earnshaw has enjoyed a career in which he has won just one major honour.
Despite playing in the Premier League for West Bromwich Albion and Cardiff City, the Wales international was successful in his quest for silverware in a country you may not quite remember.
Citing a desire to work under the club’s then sporting director Jordi Cruiff, Earnshaw’s move was based on the assumption that he would become a better player upon his return. But with a country at war to contend with, his story is quite remarkable.
“Rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into Tel Aviv”
“I’ve always wanted to play abroad sometime, experience different ideas,” Earnshaw explained Four Four Two about his stay in Israel, which came during the 2012-13 season. “Out of nowhere I got a call from the director of football, Jordi Cruyff. He said he would take care of me and he was amazing.”
“Their transfer window was closing, so I had to make a quick decision. Oscar Garcia came from Barcelona’s academy to lead the team and put together a group of Spanish coaches; in terms of football, I learned more in the first two months there.” as I have for the past six years in the UK. It was a completely different way of seeing the same game and it worked.
Earnshaw’s spell in Tel Aviv proved fruitful, with the club winning Israel’s top flight during his interim spell in 2013. However, winning silverware isn’t what sticks out in his mind, as he explained when we asked him about life in war. – a torn landscape.
“Tel Aviv is such a beautiful place, but the war with Palestine escalated while I was there,” the former Wales international pointed out.
“A few months later, during training, the sirens went off: for the first time in years, rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into Tel Aviv. We had to go to the side of the building and take cover.”
“It went on for weeks and weeks. I went to play football – I never knew I’d end up in the middle of a war I wasn’t part of. I had a lot of amazing experiences and met good people.” but it was a crazy situation.”
Earnshaw returned to Cardiff in the summer and was deemed surplus to requirements by then manager Malky Mackay. A few months later, he moved to Canada and linked up with MLS team Toronto FC.
He ended his career in 2015 after further stints in Vancouver Whitecaps and Chicago Fire, but his work in West Asia is undoubtedly unforgettable for him.
