Tammer Bany - West Brom's street footballer from Copenhagen
Tammer Bany's footballing education came on the streets of Copenhagen.
He is something of a one-off in Albion's squad, a throw-back maybe? There were no academy formative years in Denmark. Becoming a professional footballer even in his homeland must have seemed a long way away in his mid-teens.
"I never played in these big teams," Bany, 21, tells the Express & Star from Albion's training base in Austria. "I was always like a 'local talent' in Denmark, I was never in an academy.
"I played street football. I played more amateur leagues.
"At 15 or 16 I started to play in an academy at League One (level). My first club Vanløse (VIF) was like below League Two in England. From 16 I played senior football in the third division."
Playing on the streets with friends - and adversaries - helped, he believes, make Bany the rough-and-ready attacking talent he is today. The player Albion decision-makers spent more than £3million on in January.
"The streets helped me with and without the ball," the attacker adds. "I am also very aggressive and I 100 per cent got that from the streets.
"Maybe players here and in (previous club) Randers have trained the simpler things for a long time and are better at simpler things, but when we play games I feel I can be more creative, maybe, because I played difficult football."
