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Owen Hargreaves parents emigrated to Canada from the North West of England in the early 1980's. His father played for Bolton Wanderers and also for Calgary Kickers in the Canadian Soccer League. The midfielder began his football with Calgary Foothills FC and was spotted by scouts from Bayern Munich aged 16. In July 1997 he made the big move across the Atlantic to Germany where he played in the Bayern Under-19 team for two and a half years, then spent six months with the Amateur team.
Hargreaves was eligible to play internationals for any one of the four Home Nations or Canada and would also have been eligible for Germany under residency rules. On 31th August 2000, the then England U21 manager, Howard Wilkinson, gave Hargreaves his debut in a match against Georgia at the Riverside Stadium which ended in a 6-1 win for England. Further appearances for the U21s followed in friendlies against Italy and Spain.
On 12th August 2000, Hargreaves played in his first senior appearance for Bayern as a late substitute for Carsten Jancker. His first start came a month later against SpVgg Unterhaching on 16th September 2000. It was Hargreaves's superb high energy midfield performances (were he replaced Bayern hero Stefan Effenberg) in the Champions League semi final against Real Madrid that really brought him to the attention of British football fans and media alike.
The season proved to be a historic one for Bayern Munich as they won the Bundesliga and also healed the heartache of losing to Manchester United in 1999 by claiming the UEFA Champions League in a penalty shoot-out win over Valancia. In doing so Owen became only one of only two English players to have won a Champions League medal with a non-English club, the other being Steve McManaman.
Hargreaves was now a prime candidate for the England team and played his first full international in August 2001 against the Netherlands at White Hart Lane. This made him the only England player in history who has neither lived, nor played club football, in England.
In the 2001-02 season Hargreaves established himself as a first team Bayern regular, making 46 appearances in all.
Though the team finished without a trophy it was a decisive year for Hargreaves as he emerged as a key player in the team and midfield heir to Effenberg.
At the World Cup in Korea/Japan, Hargreaves was the only player playing outside the Premiership to be selected for England's 2002 FIFA World Cup squad. A calf injury meant he only featured in two matches. 2002-2003 saw Hargreaves celebrate another domestic success as Bayern won the domestic double of Bundesliga title and the DFB Cup. In January 2003 he scored his first Bundesliga goal in the game against Borussia Mönchengladbach.
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The following season Bayern missed out on silverware but in 2004-05 it was business as usual for Hargreaves and the Munich giants as they won another German championship and DFB Cup. Incredibly in the 2005-06 season, Bayern had back to back sucess by adding another Bundesliga and Cup title double. Hargreaves also had the honour of scoring the first goal at the new Allianz Arena in a competitive match on 5th August 2005, against Borussia Mönchengladbach.
Up to this point the midfielder had never reproduced his club form for the national side and bore the brunt of savage criticism / mockery from the press and public. This tended to overlook the fact he was nearly always played out of position on the left or right wing. Consigned to the role of sub didn't help either and his appearance in the opening match of the 2006 World Cup from the bench received vocal abuse from England fans.
However by the end of the tournament he was widely praised as one of the few successes in an underachieving English squad. Owen was named Man of the Match in the quarter final against Portugal and was the only English penalty taker to score in the shoot-out. He would later win both England Player of the Year and England Player of the World Cup in official FA polls (the first to win both in the same year) and won Man of the Match award in England's 4-0 win over Greece in August 2006, where he first took over the No.7 shirt of former captain David Beckham.
The England performances impressed Sir Alex Ferguson and in August 2006 United began a long running pursuit to secure his transfer to Old Trafford. Hargreaves was obviously eager for the move but the German club were sternly adamant that their player would not be leaving at any price.
It all proved academic as a broken leg meant he missed of most of Bayern's season. Owen recovered in time to help his team knock out Real Madrid in the Champions League quarter final but the Munich club finished the season trophyless and even more disasterously, outside the Champions League places.
He had enjoyed an illustrious 10 years at Bayern, winning four titles, three cups and a Champions League. Nonetheless, on 31st May 2007 it was announced that Hargreaves would join United on 1st July 2007 with a 5 year contract and a transfer fee of around £17 million. Bayern chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge described him as "one of the best holding midfielders in the world" and it is thought the new arrival will form a partnership with Michael Carrick. It has been said that Ferguson now in fact has replaced Roy Keane with two separate players: Hargreaves and Carrick.
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