Valon Behrami

Early career

Behrami started out playing football with Swiss club sides FC Stabio, FC Chiasso and FC Lugano. After a number of impressive appearances with Lugano, he was signed by Italian team Genoa in the 2003–04 season, and played for them in the Serie B championship. In January 2004 he joined Udinese along with Rodrigue Boisfer in exchange for Mohammed Gargo and Vittorio Micolucci, in flopped transfer price in co-ownership deal to create "paper" profit. In the 2004–05 season, Genoa bought out Udinese' rights to the player and loaned him out to Verona, again in Serie B.

Lazio

After an impressive season with Verona, Lazio signed him on 25 July 2005, as first a co-ownership deal for €2.7 million. and Lazio bought him outright in January 2006, for the same price. Despite his clearance hitting Rodrigo Taddei's head and ricocheting into Lazio's goal to concede their first goal of the match, his 92nd minute winning goal etched Behrami's name into Lazio's history books as they won the Derby della Capitale on 19 March 2008 and virtually finished the Scudetto hopes for rivals Roma.

West Ham United

On 23 July 2008, West Ham United signed Behrami from Lazio, with the player signing a five-year contract for a fee of £5 million. Behrami made his debut for West Ham in the 2–1 home win over Wigan Athletic on16 August 2008. His versatility would see him become a vital part of West Ham's midfield, having begun the season as a stand in for captain Lucas Neill at…

Behrami was capped for the Swiss national team at the Under-18, Under-19 and "A" levels; playing at FIFA World Cup in 2006, 2010, 2014 and 2018. He received his first call-up to the senior team in October 2005, when Köbi Kuhn added him to the squad for World Cup qualifiers against France and the Republic of Ireland. He made his senior debut against France on 8 October 2005. Behrami scored a key goal against Turkey at the Stade de Suisse in the first leg of their 2006 World Cup qualifying playoff tie. During the 2006 tournament, he suffered a groin injury which put him on the sidelines for the first two group matches. In the third match against South Korea, he was substituted late in the game in the 88th minute. He did not participate in the loss to Ukraine in the last 16. Behrami was in the starting eleven of Switzerland for all three matches during the 2008 UEFA European Championship, playing a total of 272 minutes. On 21 June, in the 2010 World Cup, after appearing to elbow Chilean player Arturo Vidal, Behrami was sent off with a red card in the second Group H match against Chile and became the first Swiss player to be sent off in a World Cup match. Behrami was included in the Switzerland 23-man squad for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. In their opening game, on 17 June, a 1–1 draw with Brazil, his performance was described as excellent, with note being made of his constant harassment of Brazil's Neymar. He became the first Swiss player to appear in four consecutive World Cup…

A defensive midfielder, Behrami is known for his tenacity and physicality on the pitch, as well as his ability to recover balls through his tackling; his physical and defensive qualities complemented the creative and technical abilities of compatriot Granit Xhaka in midfield at international level.

Behrami was born to Kosovar Albanian parents in Mitrovica, Kosovo, at the time part of SR Serbia within SFR Yugoslavia. When he was five, his parents both lost their jobs; his mother Halime as a secretary and his father Ragip as a manager of a plastics company. As a result, Behrami along with his parents and older sister Valentina moved to Stabio, a village in Ticino, a canton in the Italian-speaking region of Switzerland. Behrami's mother described him as energetic: "As a child, running was Valon's favourite pastime – he just never got tired. Even now, he can hardly sit still for a second. He always needs a ball at his feet."