Henri Anier (born 17 December 1990) is an Estonian 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 ...

who plays as a striker for

Thai League 1 The Thai League 1 ( th, ไทยลีก 1), often referred to as T1, is the top level of the Thai football league system. Contested by 16 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with Thai League 2. Seasons run from August ...

club

Muangthong United Muangthong United Football Club ( th, สโมสรฟุตบอลเมืองทอง ยูไนเต็ด) is a Thai professional football club based in Muang Thong Thani, Nonthaburi province. The club plays in the Thai League ...

and the Estonia national team.

Club career

Flora

Anier came through the

Flora Flora is all the plant life present in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring (indigenous) native plants. Sometimes bacteria and fungi are also referred to as flora, as in the terms '' gut flora'' or '' skin flora''. E ...

youth system. He moved to

Esiliiga The Esiliiga is the second division in the Estonian football league system. The Esiliiga is ranked below the Meistriliiga and above the Esiliiga B. As in most countries with low temperatures in winter time, the season starts in March and ends i ...

club

Warrior A warrior is a person specializing in combat or warfare, especially within the context of a tribal or clan-based warrior culture society that recognizes a separate warrior aristocracies, class, or caste. History Warriors seem to have be ...

on loan for the 2007 season, and scored 13 goals in 24 league appearances. In January 2008, Anier was promoted to Flora's first team. He made his debut in the

Meistriliiga Meistriliiga (, known as the A. Le Coq Premium Liiga for sponsorship reasons) is the highest division of the Estonian Football Association annual football championship. The league was founded in 1992, and was initially semi-professional with ...

on 8 March 2008, in a 1–1 home draw against Nõmme Kalju. On 29 March 2008, aged 17 years 103 days, Anier became Flora's youngest ever goalscorer in the Meistriliiga when he scored in a 3–0 away win over Tallinna Kalev. In August 2009, Anier joined Italian club

Sampdoria Unione Calcio Sampdoria, commonly referred to as Sampdoria (), is an Italian professional football club based in Genoa. The club was formed in 1946 from the merger of two existing sports clubs whose roots can be traced back to the 1890s, ...

on a season-long loan, where he played for the club's Primavera side. Anier returned to Flora in July 2010. He scored 13 goals in 16 appearances and won his first Meistriliiga title in the 2010 season. He won his second Meistriliiga title in the 2011 season, and was Flora's top goalscorer with 21 goals.

Viking

On 20 December 2011, Anier signed a three-year contract with Norwegian

Tippeligaen Eliteserien () is a Norwegian professional league for association football clubs. At the top of the Norwegian football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. Contested by 16 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion ...

club

Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

. He made his debut in the Tippeligaen on 26 March 2012, in a 2–2 away draw against

Sandnes Ulf Sandnes Ulf is a Norwegian association football club from Sandnes, Rogaland, currently playing in the 1. divisjon, the second highest division in the Norwegian football league system. The club play their home matches at Øster Hus Arena. The cl ...

Fredrikstad (loan)

On 4 April 2013, Anier joined

Adeccoligaen The Norwegian First Division, also called 1. divisjon and OBOS-ligaen (named sponsor is property developer OBOS), is the second-highest level of the Norwegian football league system. Each year, the top finishing teams in the 1. divisjon are p ...

club

Fredrikstad Fredrikstad (; previously ''Frederiksstad''; literally "Fredrik's Town") is a List of cities in Norway, city and Municipalities of Norway, municipality in Viken (county), Viken Counties of Norway, county, Norway. The administrative centre of the ...

on loan until 15 July.

Motherwell

On 29 July 2013, Anier joined

Scottish Premiership The Scottish Premiership, known as the cinch Premiership for sponsorship reasons, is the top division of the Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL), the league competition for men's professional football clubs in Scotland. The Scottis ...

club Motherwell on an initial six-month loan, after being recommended by his Estonian teammate Henrik Ojamaa, who left the club the previous month. He made his first official appearance for Motherwell on 1 August 2013, in a 2–0 loss to Kuban Krasnodar in the first leg of the

UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (abbreviated as UEL, or sometimes, UEFA EL), formerly the UEFA Cup, is an annual football club competition organised since 1971 by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European football clubs. ...

third qualifying round. Anier made his debut in the Scottish Premiership on 4 August 2013, coming on as a substitute for Robert McHugh in the 69th minute and scoring the only goal of an away win over Hibernian. On 10 January 2014, Anier signed for Motherwell permanently on a two-and-a-half-year contract. He ended the 2013–14 season with 9 goals in 37 appearances in all competitions for ''the Steelmen''.

Erzgebirge Aue

On 19 June 2014, Anier and his brother

Hannes Hannes is a masculine given name and a diminutive of Johannes or Hannibal. Hannes may refer to: *Hannes Alfvén (1908–1995) Swedish chemist and Nobel-prize winner * Hannes Aigner (born 1989), German slalom canoeist and Olympic medalist * Hannes ...

signed three-year contracts with German 2. Bundesliga side

Erzgebirge Aue Fußball Club Erzgebirge Aue e.V., commonly known as simply FC Erzgebirge Aue or Erzgebirge Aue (), is a German football club based in Aue-Bad Schlema, Saxony. The former East German side was a founding member of the 3. Liga in 2008–09, ...

. He made his debut for the club on 9 August 2014, in a 5–1 home loss to

VfL Bochum Verein für Leibesübungen Bochum 1848 Fußballgemeinschaft, commonly referred to as simply VfL Bochum (), is a Football in Germany, German association football club based in the city of Bochum, North Rhine-Westphalia. The club has spent 35 seas ...

. Anier made eight appearances for Erzgebirge Aue, but struggled to break into the first team under new manager Tomislav Stipić.

Dundee United

On 15 January 2015, Anier returned to the Scottish Premiership, signing a two-and-a-half-year contract with

Dundee United Dundee United Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the city of Dundee. The club name is usually abbreviated to Dundee United. Formed in 1909, originally as Dundee Hibernian, the club changed to the present name in 1 ...

. He made his debut for the club on 21 January 2015, in a 1–1 away draw against St Mirren. Dundee United were relegated from the Scottish Premiership in the 2015–16 season. On 8 August 2016, Anier left Dundee United after his contract was cancelled by mutual consent.

Hibernian (loan)

On 1 September 2015, Anier joined

Scottish Championship The Scottish Championship, known as the cinch Championship for sponsorship reasons, is the second tier of the Scottish Professional Football League, the league competition for men's professional football clubs in Scotland. The Scottish Champio ...

side Hibernian on a season-long loan. However, on 14 January 2016, he was recalled by relegation-threatened Dundee United.

Kalmar FF

On 10 August 2016, Anier signed for Swedish Allsvenskan club

Kalmar FF Kalmar Fotbollförening, more commonly known as Kalmar FF, is a Swedish professional football club based in Kalmar. The club is affiliated to Smålands Fotbollförbund and play their home games at Guldfågeln Arena. Formed on 15 June 1910, the cl ...

until the end of the 2016 season. He made his debut in the Allsvenskan on 14 August 2016, in a 1–1 home draw against

Malmö FF Malmö Fotbollförening, commonly known as Malmö FF, Malmö, or MFF, is a professional football club and the most successful football club in Sweden in terms of trophies won. Formed in 1910 and affiliated with the Scania Football Association ...

. On 17 September 2016, Anier scored his first goal for the club in a 2–0 home win over

Östersunds FK Östersunds Fotbollsklubb, commonly known simply as Östersunds FK, Östersund () or (especially locally) ÖFK, is a Swedish professional football club located in Östersund, Sweden and since 2022 play in the Swedish second tier, Superettan. The ...

Inverness Caledonian Thistle

On 16 January 2017, Anier returned to Scottish football, signing for

Inverness Caledonian Thistle Inverness Caledonian Thistle Football Club, commonly known as Caley Thistle, is a professional football club based in Inverness, Scotland. The team currently competes in the Scottish Championship, the second tier of the Scottish Professional ...

until the end of the 2016–17 season. He made his debut for the club on 21 January, in a 2–1 away victory over

Elgin City Elgin City Football Club (also known as City or The Black and Whites) is a professional senior football club based in Elgin, Moray. Elgin was founded in 1893 and originally played their football in the Highland Football League. The club was g ...

in the fourth round of the

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Veikkausliiga Veikkausliiga (; sv, Tipsligan) is the premier division of Finnish football, the highest tier of the Finnish football league structure, comprising the top 12 clubs of the country. Its main sponsor is the Finnish national betting agency Veikka ...

club

FC Lahti FC Lahti is a Finnish football club based in the city of Lahti. It currently plays in the Finnish Premier League ('' Veikkausliiga'') after placing first in the Finnish First Division ('' Ykkönen'') during season 2011. The homeground of FC ...

Suwon FC

On 1 February 2019, South Korean club Suwon FC announced the signing of Anier.

International career

Anier began his youth career in 2006 with the Estonia under-17 team. He also represented the under-19, under-21, and under-23 national sides. On 25 May 2011, Anier made an unofficial senior debut for

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

, in a 2–1 home loss to Basque Country in a non-

FIFA FIFA (; stands for ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' ( French), meaning International Association Football Federation ) is the international governing body of association football, beach football and futsal. It was found ...

match. On 10 June 2011, he was named by manager

Tarmo Rüütli Tarmo Rüütli (born 11 August 1954) is an Estonian football manager and former football player. As player, Rüütli won the 1985 Estonian Championship with Pärnu Kalakombinaat/MEK. As manager, he led Levadia to three Meistriliiga titles a ...

in the Estonia squad to face

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

and

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

in friendly matches. Anier made his senior international debut in a 4–0 loss to Chile on 19 June 2011. He scored his first international goal on 8 November 2012, in a 2–1 away win over

Oman Oman ( ; ar, عُمَان ' ), officially the Sultanate of Oman ( ar, سلْطنةُ عُمان ), is an Arabian country located in southwestern Asia. It is situated on the southeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula, and spans the mouth of t ...

in a friendly.

Personal life

Anier's younger brother

is also a professional footballer.

Career statistics

Club

International

:''Scores and results list Estonia's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Anier goal.''

Honours

Flora *

: 2010, 2011 *

Estonian Cup The Estonian Cup ( et, Eesti Karikas) is the national knockout competition in Estonian football. In 2012, the competition was unofficially rebranded as Evald Tipner's Cup. The winner will compete in UEFA Europa Conference League first qualifyi ...

: 2007–08, 2008–09, 2010–11 *

Estonian Supercup The Estonian Supercup ( et, Eesti Superkarikas) is Estonian football's annual super cup, contested between the champions of the previous Meistriliiga season and the holders of the Estonian Cup. If the Meistriliiga champions also won the Estoni ...

: 2009, 2011

References

External links