Anders Erik Limpar (born 24 September 1965) is a Swedish former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who played as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

. Limpar featured for the clubs

IF Brommapojkarna Idrottsföreningen Brommapojkarna, more commonly known as Brommapojkarna (meaning ''the Bromma boys'') or simply BP, is a Swedish football club located in the borough of Bromma, in the western parts of Stockholm municipality. Brommapojkarna is t ...

, Young Boys,

Cremonese Cremona (, also ; ; lmo, label= Cremunés, Cremùna; egl, Carmona) is a city and ''comune'' in northern Italy, situated in Lombardy, on the left bank of the Po river in the middle of the ''Pianura Padana'' (Po Valley). It is the capital of the ...

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

, Everton,

Birmingham City Birmingham City Football Club is a professional football club based in Birmingham, England. Formed in 1875 as Small Heath Alliance, it was renamed Small Heath in 1888, Birmingham in 1905, and Birmingham City in 1943. Since 2011, the first te ...

AIK AIK Fotboll (), more commonly known simply as AIK (), an abbreviation for Allmänna Idrottsklubben (meaning ''the public'' or ''general sports club''), is a Swedish football club competing in Allsvenskan, the top flight of Swedish football. The ...

Colorado Rapids The Colorado Rapids are an American professional soccer club based in the Denver metropolitan area. The Rapids compete in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Western Conference. Founded in 1995, as part of the Anschutz Corporation, la ...

and

Djurgårdens IF Djurgårdens Idrottsförening, commonly known simply as Djurgårdens IF, Djurgården (), and (especially locally) Djurgår'n (), Dif or DIF – is a Swedish sports association with several sections, located in Stockholm. Name The club is named ...

during a career that spanned between 1981 and 2002. A full international between 1987 and 1996, Limpar was

capped In sport, a cap is a player's appearance in a game at international level. The term dates from the practice in the United Kingdom of awarding a cap to every player in an international match of rugby football and association football. In the ea ...

58 times by

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

, scoring 6 goals altogether. He represented Sweden at the

1988 Summer Olympics The 1988 Summer Olympics (), officially known as the Games of the XXIV Olympiad () and commonly known as Seoul 1988 ( ko, 서울 1988, Seoul Cheon gubaek palsip-pal), was an international multi-sport event held from 17 September to 2 October ...

, the

1990 FIFA World Cup The 1990 FIFA World Cup was the 14th FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial football tournament for men's senior national teams. It was held from 8 June to 8 July 1990 in Italy, the second country to host the event for a second time (the first being Me ...

UEFA Euro 1992 The 1992 UEFA European Football Championship was hosted by Sweden between 10 and 26 June 1992. It was the ninth UEFA European Championship, which is held every four years and supported by UEFA. Denmark won the 1992 championship, having qualifi ...

, as well as the

1994 FIFA World Cup The 1994 FIFA World Cup was the 15th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national soccer teams. It was hosted by the United States and took place from June 17 to July 17, 1994, at nine venues across the country. The United States ...

where Sweden finished third. In 1991, he was awarded

Guldbollen Guldbollen (''Golden Ball'') is a Swedish football award given by ''Aftonbladet'' and the Swedish Football Association to the best male Swedish footballer each year. History The award was created by Bengt Liljedahl and between 1946 to 1965 it was ...

as Sweden's best footballer of the year.

Club career

Early career

Born in

Solna Solna Municipality ( sv, Solna kommun or , ) is a municipality in Stockholm County in Sweden, located just north of Stockholm City Centre. Its seat is located in the town of Solna, which is a part of the Stockholm urban area. Solna is one of t ...

with Hungarian roots, Limpar started playing football in

Brommapojkarna Idrottsföreningen Brommapojkarna, more commonly known as Brommapojkarna (meaning ''the Bromma boys'') or simply BP, is a Swedish football club located in the borough of Bromma, in the western parts of Stockholm municipality. Brommapojkarna is t ...

, famous for its production of footballing talent. He then played for

Örgryte Örgryte is one of the 21 ''stadsdelsnämndsområden'' (a kind of district often translated as borough) of Gothenburg Municipality, Sweden. It is a largely upper middle class residential area, just to the east of the city centre. It has a populati ...

, joining in the wake of its sensational Swedish championship title in

1985 The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a ...

. Limpar quickly became one of the hottest properties in Swedish football, and as so he was offered the chance to journey to Switzerland with

Bern german: Berner(in)french: Bernois(e) it, bernese , neighboring_municipalities = Bremgarten bei Bern, Frauenkappelen, Ittigen, Kirchlindach, Köniz, Mühleberg, Muri bei Bern, Neuenegg, Ostermundigen, Wohlen bei Bern, Zollikofen , website ...

club Young Boys. He followed this up in a one-season spell in Italy with

during the 1989–90 season.

Arsenal

His club career peaked when he signed for

in the summer of 1990 from Cremonese for £1m. Limpar quickly impressed in the Makita Tournament at Wembley and made his League debut in the 3-0 win at Wimbledon 25 August 1990. He went on to win the league title in the 1990–91 season. Limpar was also involved in the brawl against Manchester United 20 October 1990 and made the winning goal. He played a particularly notable part in the 1990–91 season, scoring some important goals, and impressing in his first season with exciting wing play and crowd-pleasing displays. These included a hat-trick against

Coventry City Coventry City Football Club is a professional association football club based in Coventry, West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England. The team currently compete in the EFL Championship, Championship, the second tier of the English footbal ...

in a 6–1 win on the final day of the league season, by which time Arsenal were already champions. He managed a total of 13 goals that season, with 11 of them coming in the league. He won the

Sweden's Player of the Year awardin 1991. In the season 1991–92, Limpar was in and out of the side. A jaw injury kept him out for several weeks but he still netted some spectacular goals including a 40 yard chip in Arsenals 4-0 win over

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

20 April 1992. A succession of knocks hampered him the following season, and he sat on the sidelines injured for Arsenal's 1993 wins in both the League and the FA Cups. He and manager

George Graham George Graham (born 30 November 1944), nicknamed "Stroller", is a Scottish former Association football, football player and manager (association football), manager. In his successful playing career, he made 455 appearances in England's Football ...

eventually fell out and with his contract due to come to an end in May 1994, Limpar, who was seeking a new deal at the club, was not offered one by Graham. Limpar played his last match with Arsenal against

Southampton Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...

19 March 1994. Limpar scored 20 goals from 116 appearances for Arsenal where he was popular with the fans.

Everton

On transfer deadline day in March 1994, Limpar transferred to Everton for £1.6 million. He made his debut for Everton in a home defeat (0-1 to Tottenham Hotspur) on 26 March 1994. Limpar won a crucial penalty for Everton in the final day victory over Wimbledon in 1994, which preserved Everton's Premiership status. Whilst playing for the toffees he won the

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic English football. First played during the 1871–72 season, it is the oldest national football competi ...

for the first time in

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is O. J. Simpson murder case, acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the 1994, year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The ...

. Limpar went on to play a vital role in the Cup final at

Wembley Wembley () is a large suburbIn British English, "suburb" often refers to the secondary urban centres of a city. Wembley is not a suburb in the American sense, i.e. a single-family residential area outside of the city itself. in north-west Londo ...

, with a run from inside his own half leading to Everton's winning goal being scored by

Paul Rideout Paul Rideout (born 14 August 1964) is an English former professional footballer and youth team coach of Major League Soccer side Sporting Kansas City. As a player, he was a striker from 1980 until 2002, notably in the Premier League with Ever ...

. He also hit a memorable 50-yard reverse-pass which led to an Everton break-away that

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...

Club career

Early career

Arsenal

Everton

Birmingham City

Later career

International career

Coaching career

Personal life

Career statistics

International

Honours

References

External links