Good for Owen. Being a family acquientance from way back in the mid 80's, I am sure he and the family are thrilled....a dream come true to play in England. His dad may have to swallow hard to be a Man U supporter, but...
A pretty good return for Bayern, who made hm the player he is today. $35 million after 10 years ago giving him some unknown 16yr old Canadian a general, basic tryout as more or less a favour?
As I've said here before, the CSA are run and have always been run by, a bunch of ego maniacis running on politics.
A German club half a contintent away spotted talent in him, where the CSA wouldn't take a look at you if your home province wasn't QC/ON or maybe BC. Being in the upper echelon of the talent pool myself back in the day, many many players of Owen's talent or more in this province at 16, 17, 18 were passed over in this country for basic U-17, U19 national tryout camps, simply based on the fact that Alberta had no pull in the CSA upper ranks.
Owen still got fortunate to stick with Bayern like he did, but once he was in their system, he was set to succeed.
Thus, I don't blame him one bit. I liken it to being born in the UK, but being good enough to play for Team Canada in hockey. The CSA came waddling up to the trough 3 or 4 years after Owen was in Bayern and was starting to make regular appearances in the top club, trying to play the national card. I don't think they could spell his name before that or know what club he played on here in Calgary.
Will be interesting to see how he gets treated/handles the increased spotlight of the UK press, as opposed to the mother hen mentality of a club like Bayern protects some of thier players, and the German press in general being a bit more respectful.
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