Marcus Allbäck - Striker Date of Birth: June 5, 1973 Birthplace: Göteborg (Gothenburg), Sweden Nationality: Swedish Height: 1.80m/6' Previous Clubs: Heerenveen (Holland), Bari (Italy), Lyngby (Denmark) and Örgryte IS (Sweden) Joined Villa: May 19, 2002 Acquisition Price: £2 million Debut: August 18, 2002 (Liverpool (h)) Contract expires: Summer 2005 Left Villa (for): August 27, 2004 (Hansa Rostock, Germany) Transfer fee: Undisclosed

Allbäck gained the attention of Aston Villa when he shone for Sweden in the 2002 World Cup. Having moved around Europe quite extensively during his career, he had settled at Heerenveen in Holland and had become a regular for Sweden. After the World Cup of 2002, he attracted clubs liek Sunderland, Feyenoord, PSV Eindhoven and Glasgow Rangers, but Aston Villa wound up securing his signature. Allbäck himself said: "Moving to Villa felt right and this is a great time for me".

After a promising start, his number of appearances in the 2003/04 season was disappointingly low, however, and transfer speculation began to pile up during the summer. On August 27, 2004, Allbäck moved on to Hansa Rostock of Germany for an undisclosed fee.