Patrick Vieira inducted into Premier League Hall of Fame

By Ben Knapton, Senior Reporter | 23 March 2022

Former Arsenal midfielder Patrick Vieira becomes the latest inductee into the Premier League's Hall of Fame alongside Wayne Rooney.

Ex-Arsenal midfielder and current Crystal Palace manager Patrick Vieira has become the latest inductee into the Premier League's Hall of Fame.

The Frenchman captained the Gunners during their 2003-04 Invincibles season - one of three Premier League titles he won in North London - after becoming Arsene Wenger's first signing for the club in 1996.

Vieira went on to make 307 appearances for Arsenal - scoring 31 goals and setting up 34 more - and has joined Wayne Rooney as the two first PL Hall of Fame inductees in 2022.

"Being inducted into the Premier League Hall of Fame is a fantastic achievement," Vieira told arsenal.com. "When I received the news, I thought about being a young boy playing in Senegal, or in a suburb of Paris.

"To be there with the best players in the Premier League, the best league in the world, is bigger than what I was ever thinking about. To have my name around those players makes me proud and makes me realise how good I was.

"It's not bad company to join. I was lucky to play at the same time as some of them, of course including Thierry Henry and Dennis Bergkamp. So to share the stage with them makes me realise I had a really good career.

"What really makes me happy and proud is when your name is mentioned by new, up-and-coming holding midfielders as an example of how they would like to play."

Vieira joins former teammates Henry and Bergkamp in the hall of fame, while Alan Shearer, David Beckham, Eric Cantona, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Roy Keane also make up the list.