"A friend of mine Dave D'Errico played in Seattle and an Irish guy was assistant coach there and he'd talked to Dave about going to Ireland to play."
In the end former USA international Robert "Bobby" Smith also ended up coming to Dundalk Football Club on loan in the fall of 1974.
And the US National Soccer Hall of Fame inductee thrived as he told us on Team 33 this week, with the extra fitness and experience of playing in a new country giving him a good platform that would stand him in good stead for a future in which he would go on to be a team-mate of Pele's and Franz Beckenbauer at the New York Cosmos.
Smith isn't the only US born player to have lined out for an Irish club. Guam international Ryan Guy was born in California and spent three years with St Patrick's Athletic between 2007 and 2010.
Over the decades, many nationalities from outside from the island of Ireland have been represented in the league, most notably Englishmen and Scots.
Overall, not far off 50 different nationalities have appeared in the League of Ireland from every continent.
There have been players from every corner of Europe from Scandinavia to the Mediterranean and from Iberia to the Baltic Sates.
Africa has been represented by the likes of Joseph N'Do (Cameroon) and Patrick Nzuzi (DR Congo).
Mexico for example had one representative briefly in the shape of David Alejandro Rojina who played a couple of games for Bray Wanderers.
But how many nations from outside this island have capped current or former League of Ireland players at full international level?
Well, we've mapped it out... and it does include some Irish born players like Eamon Zayed for example who was capped by Libya, and some who were capped before or after they ended up playing for Irish clubs.
So if you hover your mouse over the pointer, each nation will show you one example of a player that did end up getting capped:
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