Imagine if there was a player called Palace Eagles and he was playing for Crystal Palace. Or, imagine if there was a player called United Devils and he was in Ole-Gunnar Solskjaer’s squad. Well, French Ligue 1 team Saint-Etienne have something like that. Their goalkeeper is called Etienne Green. You see, the club’s traditional nickname is Les Verts, meaning The Greens. Etienne Green, get it? How cool is that?!Well, Mr Etienne Vert, err Green, has decided to represent England, the country of his birth, rather than France, the country he lived in since he was a child. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Etienne Green (@etienne_green) In a post written in French, the 21-year-old who was born in England but moved to France as a child, revealed his decision. “If the English FA are interested and decide to call me up, I’ll go with pride and commit to it 200 per cent.”Green has been at Saint-Etienne since he was nine and made his Ligue 1 debut for Les Verts last April.Saturday, 22.00: (1.82) Olympique Marseille (3.50) Saint-Etienne (4.60)He was selected for France’s under-21s in the age-grade Euro in Hungary this summer as the third goalkeeper. He did not play a single minute as France reached the quarter-finals. Green said the France call up “was a surprise as well as an honour.””After the European Championship, the English FA approached me to see if I was interested. A painful, if not impossible, choice. I was born in England and have lived in Saint-Etienne since the age of four. My mother is French and my father is English. It’s like asking someone to choose between their two parents. After letting some time pass, I finally made the decision to make myself available to the English FA. It is not a rational or opportunistic choice. Two great countries, two great teams that have always made me dream.” View this post on Instagram A post shared by Etienne Green (@etienne_green) There you have it, Etienne Green wants to play for England. That’s cool. We just hope he doesn’t leave Saint-Etienne because Etienne Green should be a Green player of Saint-Etienne.
