It’s that time of the year when the Nobel Prizes are awarded — in physics, chemistry, literature, physiology/medicine, peace and economics. The awards are named after the Swedish chemist, engineer, and industrialist Alfred Nobel, who was most famous in his own right for inventing dynamite.
With that in mind, here, for the first time, is football’s equivalent.
Welcome to the (entirely fictional) Noble prize, named after West Ham legend Mark Noble — unquestionably the most commonly cited player this century in ‘he deserved to play for England’ conversations. It is awarded each year to the Premier League footballer aged 25 or over who has never been capped by his country.
Here are the criteria:
(a) Players can be of any nationality but must play in the Premier League. Performances in the cup competitions are also taken into account.
(b) The player must be aged 24 or over on the final day of the season (which is when the judging takes place), although older players are considered more deserving of the award.
(c) The player must have zero full international caps.
(d) A player can only win the award once.
(e) In the event a player is capped in the future, he still keeps his award.
It’s as simple as that. Here are the 32 winners!
1992-93: Steve Bruce, Manchester United (aged 32 at the end of the season)
Still the go-to footballer as the best Englishman never to play for England. Bruce was Manchester United’s captain as they dominated the early Premier League years, forming a reliable partnership with the speedier Gary Pallister, who did receive international honours. Bobby Robson, who managed England between 1982 and 1990, later admitted to Bruce he should have capped him.
Bruce was a solid defender, particularly in the air, and famously scored the two most important goals of this inaugural Premier League season as United completed a late comeback to win 3-2 against Sheffield Wednesday, putting them on course for the title.
1993-94: Mark Bright, Sheffield Wednesday (31)
Although he is most associated with Crystal Palace, where he formed a prolific rhyming strike partnership with Ian Wright, Bright’s best top-flight goalscoring campaign came for Wednesday. He scored 19 goals in the 1993-94 season, including a sensational run of eight goals in eight league games between December and February.
With Bright 31 by this point, and with England rebuilding having missed out on World Cup qualification, he was never really in the frame.
1994-95: Tim Sherwood, Blackburn Rovers (26)
It seems strange, looking back, that the first two Premier League-winning captains were both English, but not England internationals.
Sherwood was a good all-round midfielder: a tough tackler, a reliable passer and an occasional goalscorer too. Although manager Kenny Dalglish planned to pair him with David Batty, injury meant Sherwood spent this season alongside Mark Atkins, an unheralded player who popped up with some crucial goals, meaning Sherwood played a slightly more withdrawn role.
Voted into the PFA Team of the Year, Sherwood wasn’t considered by England manager Terry Venables or his successor, Glenn Hoddle. It took until Kevin Keegan’s appointment in 1999, by which point Sherwood was 30, for him to win three caps.
1995-96: Ian Woan, Nottingham Forest (28)
A classy winger who lacked speed but boasted a wonderful left foot — a rare quality in English football at this time — the most memorable game of Woan’s career came in February 1996 when he converted two wonderful free kicks in a televised FA Cup replay against Tottenham Hotspur. The first was bent around the wall, the second was powered into the far corner from the right of the box. Woan was only taking the free kicks that night because Stuart Pearce, the regular taker, was out injured.
Woan also managed eight league goals and 10 assists that season — only the Liverpool duo of Steve McManaman and Stan Collymore created more — but he was never in serious contention for international honours with England.
1996-97: Julian Dicks, West Ham (28)
An aggressive left-back, Dicks was probably good enough to have represented England, but his disciplinary record was a problem. Two incidents in September 1995 involving John Spencer and Wright meant he became the focus of attention for his dirtiness, with Sky Sports’ Andy Gray going to town on Dicks’ aggression on Monday Night Football.
Dicks refused to appear on television with Gray. “He wanted me to go on his chat show but he wouldn’t meet me one-to-one. I wouldn’t go on, because he’s experienced at talking on TV and I’m not. If I met him in private, I could tell him he’s a liar if I wanted,” Dicks reasoned.
Dicks claims that, at a later date, he bumped into John Gorman, assistant to England manager Hoddle, who said that Dicks would have a better chance of a call-up if he didn’t have a shaven head. While that was probably a joke, it seems Dicks’ reputation was a serious issue and he later declared that he didn’t want to be considered for an England call-up.
1997-98: Ray Parlour, Arsenal (25)
A surprise beneficiary of Arsene Wenger’s appointment as Arsenal manager, Parlour evolved from a grafting central box-to-box player into a goalscoring right-sided midfielder. The only English player in Arsenal’s midfield and attack (due to Wright’s injury problems), Parlour tucked inside more than Marc Overmars on the other flank, and those two were Arsenal’s best players during the run-in. Parlour was man of the match in the FA Cup final victory over Newcastle United that sealed the double.
His fine performances that season brought only an appearance for the England B side, although his continued good form earned him full international recognition the following year. In 2000, he was unfortunate that a 30-yard strike against Finland, which hit the bar and crossed the line, was not given as a goal, and his final cap came in England’s last game before Sven-Goran Eriksson took charge.
1998-99: Steve Guppy, Leicester (30)
The only outfielder to play every single minute of this Premier League campaign, Guppy epitomised the division’s brief obsession with wing-backs just before the turn of the century. Excelling under Martin O’Neill, who he had also played under at Wycombe Wanderers, Guppy was a tricky dribbler but was mainly renowned for his left-footed crosses. With England still lacking left-footers, he became another popular shout for an England call-up.
Guppy had represented England Under-21s and their semi-professional team (now known as England C) before adding a B-team cap. Then, in October 1999 he was called up by Keegan for a game against Belgium — he is still the only player to earn an England cap at those four levels.
1999-2000: Paolo Di Canio, West Ham (31)
The first foreign player on this list. Di Canio probably would have won this award for his sensational scissor-kick volley against Wimbledon in March 2000 alone.
On top of that, the Italian forward produced arguably the most consistent season of his career. He was the only Premier League player to reach double figures in terms of goals and assists — not that assists were really spoken about at this point.
He was never really in line for an Italy call-up, considering the top-class options they had up front. Di Canio’s unfashionable mid-table Premier League club didn’t help. Two years afterwards, when Giovanni Trappatoni was asked if he was considering calling up Di Canio for the World Cup, he responded, “Only if there is a bubonic plague.”
2000-01: Marcus Stewart, Ipswich Town (28)
To reiterate, no one really spoke about assists at this point, let alone ‘combined goals and assists’ — but just as Di Canio was third by that measure the previous season, Stewart was third this season behind Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Thierry Henry, starring for an exciting Ipswich side that finished fifth, the best performance by a promoted side this century.
A hard-working striker who worked the channels well, as the top English scorer in the Premier League, he can feel unlucky not to have been handed a call-up — especially in an era when Michael Ricketts and Darius Vassell were handed opportunities.
2001-02: Carlo Cudicini, Chelsea (28)
Plucked from the Italian lower leagues and suddenly becoming a top-class goalkeeper at 27, Cudicini was briefly considered the Premier League’s best shot-stopper as Arsenal and Manchester United struggled to find a reliable No 1.
He was voted Chelsea’s Player of the Year for this season and in November 2002, received a solitary call-up to the Italy side — but he did not displace Gianluigi Buffon or Francesco Toldo, and remained uncapped.
2002-03: Kevin Campbell, Everton (33)
Campbell died this year at 54 and it’s difficult to remember such fulsome, warm tributes for any former player. Campbell was a truly excellent all-round striker, a larger-than-life personality and a genuine hero for fans of Arsenal, Nottingham Forest and Everton.
This season, Campbell managed 10 Premier League goals and helped nurture Wayne Rooney, whose breakthrough came at the start of the campaign. Rooney thrived playing off his experienced strike partner, while Campbell relished bringing the best from a 17-year-old who went on to become England’s record goalscorer (before Harry Kane surpassed his tally in 2023). Campbell, meanwhile, had to settle for being the top-scoring Englishman in the Premier League to never win a senior cap.
2003-04: Steed Malbranque, Fulham (24)
A bright, energetic wide midfielder with an eye for goal, Malbranque was unfortunate to rise to prominence when France had a sensational range of attacking options. He started every game for Fulham this season, reaching double figures for assists, and was the outstanding player in their memorable 3-1 victory over Manchester United at Old Trafford in October 2003.
Malbranque did receive a call-up to the France squad in 2004 — and again in 2012 — but was never capped. He sporadically declared himself available for Belgium, too, having been born there, but never received a call.
2004-05: Kevin Davies, Bolton Wanderers (28)
Plucky Bolton finished in sixth, level on 58 points with the Liverpool team that won the Champions League. They were an unfashionable long-ball side who, nevertheless, featured the technical talents of legendary midfielder Jay-Jay Okocha, the speed of El-Hadji Diouf and the experience of Euro 2004 winner Stelios Giannakopoulos. Davies was crucial, battling for long balls and feeding team-mates. Famed for constantly topping both the ‘fouls won’ and ‘fouls committed’ categories, Davies was never a prolific goalscorer, but defenders hated playing against him.
Scotland were interested in capping him and were disappointed when Davies explained he did not have any Scottish relatives. “You’d think with a name like Davies, I’d be more likely to have Welsh blood in me,” he said.
Davies eventually got a single England cap in 2010. At 33, he was the oldest England debutant for 60 years. He replaced Peter Crouch and received a booking for backing into a Montenegro centre-back, which was a fitting sole contribution to his national side.
2005-06: Jimmy Bullard, Wigan Athletic (27)
For all the focus on his banter during — and after — his playing career, Bullard was a genuinely excellent central midfielder in his debut Premier League campaign. He often dominated the centre of the pitch with driving runs and long-range passes, and was an excellent set-piece taker, helping Wigan Athletic reach the League Cup final.
Bullard was linked with a call-up to the Germany squad, who he could represent courtesy of his grandmother, before their World Cup on home soil. That never materialised, and Bullard was called up twice under England manager Fabio Capello in 2008 but never got onto the pitch. After a game against Germany, Capello apologised to Bullard for not introducing him as a sub, saying he didn’t realise it would have been his debut.
2006-07: Mikel Arteta, Everton (25)
If you could win this award multiple times, Arteta would probably be its most frequent winner. This was probably his best season for Everton, when he registered nine goals and nine assists. That combined tally of 18 put him behind only Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Dimitar Berbatov and Frank Lampard, a seriously impressive return for a patient passer who had been pushed into more advanced positions by David Moyes, generally on the left flank. He was also the most fouled player in the Premier League that season, showing he offered trickery on the ball, if not serious speed.
It’s quite possible that Spain had more midfield options in the late 2000s than any nation has ever had, so Arteta remained uncapped. It was often rumoured that England had looked to nationalise Arteta, although due to the complex agreement among home nations involving international eligibility, this was never on the cards.
2007-08: Sylvain Distin, Portsmouth (30)
At his best, Distin was the complete defender. Quick, strong and useful for playing out from the back as a left-footer, he has made more Premier League appearances than any other foreign outfielder, across spells with Newcastle, Manchester City, Portsmouth, Everton and briefly Bournemouth. This season, he was a key part of the Portsmouth side that lifted the FA Cup at Wembley.
He took his lack of international honours in good grace with a tweet in 2014. “I’m retiring from the France team,” he wrote. “It was a wonderful experience and after a record of 0 caps, it’s time to say goodbye and focus on my club.”
2008-09: Matt Taylor, Bolton Wanderers (27)
It’s a surprise that Taylor finds himself on this list. When starring on the left flank for Portsmouth in their promotion-winning campaign of 2002-03 he seemed a surefire bet for a call-up given England’s long-standing issues down that side.
Initially excelling as a wing-back, Taylor was generally considered a left-back but later pushed on to midfield and in his 2008-09 season at Bolton, hit 10 league goals. Always a set-piece specialist, that tally included three direct free-kick goals.
Perhaps not creative enough to play as a winger at international level or defensively solid enough to play left-back, he was unfortunate to peak when few top sides were using wing-backs.
2009-10: Bobby Zamora, Fulham (29)
Not merely did Fulham take an Atletico Madrid side featuring Diego Forlan and Sergio Aguero to extra time in the Europa League final, but there’s also a very real chance that they would have won the game had Zamora not been forced to depart through injury at the start of the second half. A journeyman striker whose best goalscoring campaigns came for Brighton & Hove Albion in the lower leagues, Zamora was unplayable on his day, often being namechecked by Jamie Carragher as one of the players he had the most problems against.
Carragher wasn’t the only one. Zamora said he thought Fabio Cannavaro was getting on a bit, and proceeded to give him a battering in Fulham’s famous comeback victory over Juventus, with the Italy captain being sent off. Zamora particularly excelled in Europe this season, scoring winners against Basel and Shakhtar Donetsk.
At this point, Capello’s first-choice England striker was Emile Heskey, and Zamora was essentially an in-form version of him. Injury ruled him out of contention for that summer’s World Cup squad, but he did collect a couple of caps over the next 18 months.
2010-11: Kevin Nolan, Newcastle United (28)
Nolan was a strange player — a midfielder who often didn’t contribute much in midfield. But he was arguably the best player the Premier League has seen at the simple but very useful quality of making midfield runs, latching onto knock-downs and flick-ons, and tucking home simple chances.
He followed a 17-goal Championship campaign with this 12-goal Premier League campaign, including seven in the first 10 matches. Assists? He only managed one of them. That wasn’t what Nolan was all about. He developed a particularly good relationship with Andy Carroll, perhaps partly because Carroll was, at the time, living at Nolan’s house.
By the end of his top-flight career, Nolan had racked up the most Premier League appearances by an Englishman without receiving an international cap (a record since taken by Noble). In truth, he was never really in the frame.
2011-12: Leon Britton, Swansea City (29)
This era was perfect for Britton. It was when tiki-taka was at its peak, midway through Barcelona and Spain’s dominance of club and international football. It was when statistics, particularly those involving passing, became widely available. And it was before the rise of heavy pressing, which has characterised the last decade or so.
And therefore this unremarkable midfielder, who played 149 Premier League games and managed no goals and one assist, suddenly became fashionable. Playing in Brendan Rodgers’ Swansea side and tasked with nothing more than simple sideways passes, Britton was the only player in Europe’s top five leagues who regularly found himself challenging Barca players in terms of pass completion rate. He was probably too specific to Swansea’s style earn an international call-up, but England have long lacked deep midfielders capable of controlling the game.
2012-13: Rickie Lambert, Southampton (31)
Playing in the Premier League for the first time at 30, could Lambert score top-flight goals? Well, as someone who had scored 22 in League Two, 30 in League One and 27 in the Championship, it wasn’t a huge surprise that he racked up a respectable tally of 15. What was more surprising was Lambert’s all-round game: his link play, his intelligence, his ability to get other attackers running through on goal. A season after his former Rochdale team-mate Grant Holt also managed 15 Premier League goals for Norwich City at 30, it seemed like part of a trend.
Lambert was eventually rewarded with a call-up in August 2013, scoring with his first touch for England to secure a 3-2 victory over Scotland, and the following summer earned both a World Cup call-up and a move back to his boyhood club, Liverpool.
2013-14: Mark Noble, West Ham (27)
The man after whom this award is named, Noble may have merited a cap — particularly a couple of years after this, when England were struggling for options in midfield — although in 2013-14 he was also in fine form, winning West Ham’s Hammer of the Year award for a second time.
A fine passer and a consistent penalty taker with a habit of sending the goalkeeper the wrong way, many England managers overlooked Noble, probably because he wasn’t particularly good in a positional sense. It’s worth pointing out that Ryan Mason, Harry Winks, Danny Drinkwater, Jack Cork, Lewis Cook and Nathaniel Chalobah were all capped between 2015 and 2018, showing how England were scrabbling around for half-decent central midfielders — yet Noble was always overlooked.
In 2016, Noble revealed he had turned down a Republic of Ireland call-up — his grandparents were from Cork — because it had never been his dream to play for them, and he didn’t want to deny Irish youngsters a cap.
2014-15: Charlie Austin, Queens Park Rangers (26)
A classic lower-league goalscorer who adjusted impressively to life in the Premier League, scoring 18 goals — behind only Sergio Aguero, Kane and Diego Costa — for an otherwise hapless QPR side who finished bottom.
Austin was one of two strikers who received his first call-up at the end of the season. Jamie Vardy, having scored only five goals in his first Premier League season, was actually more of a surprising choice. But while Austin dropped down to the Championship with QPR, Leicester’s Vardy remained in the Premier League — and subsequently won it the following season. Austin never got onto the pitch for England.
2015-16: Marc Albrighton, Leicester (26)
Leicester’s shock title-winning campaign was largely about four genuinely top-class players: Kasper Schmeichel, N’Golo Kante, Riyad Mahrez and Vardy. But it was also about a group of hard-working, reliable operators who had the season of their lives.
Albrighton broke through at Aston Villa as a right-sided midfielder, but in keeping with many players of that era, found himself switched to the other flank and used as an inverted winger. Albrighton was unusual in that he didn’t focus on shooting from that side, but instead on doing the basics: protecting his full-back, covering lots of ground, and delivering a reliable stream of crosses. Acting as a balancing player to give Mahrez freedom on the other flank, Albrighton was never really mentioned in terms of England recognition, but he was a crucial part of the biggest surprise title win in English football history.
2016-17: Troy Deeney, Watford (28)
A tempestuous character but, on his day, a real handful to play against. Deeney was a consistent goalscorer in the Championship, and while never quite as prolific in the Premier League, he was excellent at using his body to hold up the ball, and good at combining with a strike partner. After their title-winning season, Leicester tried to sign him.
Deeney was never truly international class, although twice rejected calls from Jamaica. It was briefly rumoured that he qualified to play for Northern Ireland, but he later discovered that it was his great-grandfather, rather than his grandfather, who came from Northern Ireland, so he was ineligible.
2017-18: Pascal Gross, Brighton (27)
Signed for just £3million ($4m at current rates), Gross must surely be considered the best value-for-money transfer in recent Premier League history. He would eventually be used everywhere from holding midfielder to full-back but in his debut Brighton campaign, Gross was a simple No 10, charged with creating goals for Glenn Murray in an otherwise cautious Chris Hughton side. An expert set-piece taker and a committed Cruyff turner, Brighton wouldn’t have escaped relegation were it not for Gross.
Like Arteta before him, Gross would have won this award many times over had he been eligible. Unlike Arteta, he did eventually receive a Germany call-up at the age of 32, and was in the squad for the European Championship on home soil this summer.
2018-19: Conor Coady, Wolves (26)
Coady didn’t miss a single minute in Wolves’ first season after promotion, playing perhaps the most specific role in the Premier League, almost as an old-school sweeper. A converted midfielder, Coady barely registered in terms of tackles or aerial duels, but read play excellently and could hit excellent diagonal balls downfield.
With the national team starting to move away from a three-man defence at this point, Gareth Southgate admitted he simply didn’t have room for a player in Coady’s mould, although when England reverted to using that system, Coady’s call-up came in late 2020. He was part of the squad for Euro 2020 and World Cup 2022, becoming established as a typical ‘good squad player’ due to his professionalism and popularity, although he did also win 10 caps, scoring one goal.
2019-20: Michail Antonio, West Ham (30)
The only player to ever win Premier League Player of the Month for July because the campaign was affected by Covid-19. Antonio has always been a streaky player, and having only scored two goals before the shutdown in March, partly because of injury, he managed eight goals in July alone, including all four in a 4-0 thrashing of Norwich City.
His international career means Antonio is the answer to two decent quiz questions: “Which of Sam Allardyce’s former players was the only uncapped player named in his only England squad in 2016?”, and “Who is the only player to win two Premier League Player of the Month awards, one while considered English and one while considered a foreign player?” By the time of his second award, in August 2021, Antonio had given up on England and elected to represent Jamaica.
2020-21: Matheus Pereira, West Bromwich Albion (25)
It’s something of a surprise, given Brazil’s huge depth of talent, that this is the only Brazilian footballer on the list. Pereira is perhaps the most ‘lockdown’ Premier League footballer, considering he only spent one season in the division, and only three of those games were played in front of any supporters at all.
But for that season, playing for a side who finished 19th, Pereira was outstanding. He provided genuine moments of magic, particularly from set pieces, and notched 11 goals, including two in an unlikely 5-2 win at eventual European champions Chelsea. He has not been seen in Europe since — he moved to Saudi Arabia and then the United Arab Emirates, before, for the first time in his career, playing senior football in his homeland.
2021-22: Craig Dawson, West Ham (32)
An unglamorous loan signing midway through the previous season, Dawson became a cult hero among West Ham supporters thanks to his solid, no-nonsense defending and his tendency to pop up crucial goals. ‘Ballon d’Orson’ is possibly the finest nickname for a player in recent years.
Never capped by England, or ever really in contention, Dawson did appear three times for the Great Britain side at the 2012 London Olympics as an under-23s player.
2022-23: Ben Mee, Brentford (33)
Unfairly typecast as a pure old-school centre-back in an old-school Burnley side, Mee received more plaudits after his move to Brentford, where he has demonstrated more footballing ability and looked comfortable when asked to play in a three-man defence.
One of the most popular and respected players in the league, Mee scored in the memorable 4-0 thrashing of Manchester United and was voted the club’s Player of the Year at the end of a campaign when they finished in the top half of the top flight for the first time since 1938.
2023-24: Jean-Philippe Mateta, Crystal Palace (26)
Palace have long been without a prolific centre-forward, so it felt unusual for one of their players to manage 16 Premier League goals last season — especially after Mateta had only managed eight in his previous two and a half years at the club. He was voted Palace’s Player of the Year.
Mateta was rewarded with a call-up to Thierry Henry’s France squad for the Paris Olympics — and thrived. He scored a quarter-final winner against Argentina, two goals in the semi-final win over Egypt, and a 93rd-minute equaliser in the final against Spain, although France eventually lost 5-3 in extra time.
Even though he was one of France’s three designated overage players, there’s no sign of him being selected for the full national squad. The international retirements of Olivier Giroud and Antoine Griezmann at least mean there are fewer obstacles in his way.
