By Charlie Elliott
The Premiership mainly sees players from the Six Nations battling it out week in week out, with a bit of extra international flair usually coming from the top nations in the sport.
Every now and again, someone bursts onto the scene as a player from somewhere which often isn’t heard about in a rugby sense.
Their stories are usually the most unique, with them coming from a background unfamiliar to most.
Here are five countries that have only had one player ever play in the Premiership, and the stories behind them.
Pedro Bettencourt (Portugal)
Starting off this list is Portugal stalwart utility back Pedro Bettencourt, who had a brief spell at Newcastle Falcons to become the only one from his country to play in the Premiership.
With 125 points in his 36 games over an 11-year international career, this form was not translated over to England, with only a solitary try in 11 Prem matches.
It seems as if the French way of playing suits him more, with him personally acknowledging that the structured nature of English rugby did not particularly work well with his creative game.
Bettencourt also cites playing Test rugby for a tier two nation as providing a springboard for his career and helping him be spotted, after he was scouted by Clermont from domestic side Lusitanos in 2014.
Recently retired after a five-year stint at Oyonnax, he can look back fondly on a career which included a win over Fiji in the 2023 World Cup pool stages.
With Os Lobos establishing themselves as one of the best in Europe, he may not be the last that we see on English shores.
Vadim Cobilas (Moldova)
Romanian and Moldovan rugby often go hand in hand, with plenty being born in one country and representing the other.
A household name that traces recent heritage to the former is Theo Dan, whose parents moved from Romania in the 1990s, but it is their neighbours to the east who have only had one player play in the Premiership.
That man is former Sale Sharks and now Bordeaux Begles prop Vadim Cobilas, who spent five years in the north-west, with over 100 appearances in Sale blue.
Formerly a wrestler in his native country, he was aware of rugby throughout his childhood but didn’t formally train until he was 20 years old.
After realising the talent he had, he joined Russian side VVA Modino, before then-Russia coach Steve Diamond discovered him and took him to Sale after making the move himself.
Since then, Cobilas has come on leaps and bounds and is paving the way for young Moldovan props like Clermont’s Cristian Ojovan, who came from the same city as him.
Ale Loman (Sweden)
Another trailblazer is Ale Loman of Sweden, who has recently become the first-ever Swede to be contracted to a Premiership club after Leicester Tigers signed him on loan from feeder club Nottingham.
Playing domestically in his native country as recently as 2023, he transferred to the University of Nottingham to pursue a rugby career and since then has been making a huge name for himself.
After only 16 senior appearances at the Championship, Tigers have signed him on loan and Loman made his debut in the recent Prem Rugby Cup win over Coventry.
Another prop, it seems as if periphery nations are best equipped to produce powerful forward players.
Likely due to the lack of technical training on offer, he is yet another example of a talent that can go under the radar for clubs who don’t look hard enough.
Erik Lund (Norway)
During the rocky era of Leeds Carnegie, when they were the yo-yo club of the Premiership, one man stood out.
Not only because he is a six-foot-eight monster, but lock Lund has also had a distinctive journey to the top flight of England.
Citing skiing as his main sport, the son of a former basketball player was bound to succeed as a lock.
After going to university in Newcastle and playing rugby socially, he realised he had a talent and was given his big break by Rotherham before Stuart Lancaster snapped him up in 2007 for Leeds.
He then went over to France to have a stellar six years at Biarritz and has cemented himself as one of the best tier two players of all time.
Aadel Kardooni (Iran)
The elephant in the room is the fact that Kardooni did make a couple of appearances for England A, but given he was born in Tehran, Iran, he is classed by most as the first and only from the country to play in the Prem.
He moved over to Dorset at age eight and as they say, the rest is history.
Over 200 appearances and 300 points have made him a club legend at Tigers and is known as one of the greatest to have never made a senior Test cap for England.
As a diminutive scrum-half, he needed unbelievable technical skills to succeed in such a physical game, which was before the professional era.
After the league went pro, he chose to move to Bedford Blues to stay part-time.
What a player and what a story of breaking down barriers, Kardooni is a unique legend in the game of rugby.
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