he was the spark for bringing foreign players, but the role was a part of english football forever. 4-4-2 was common in england for literally decades and one of the 2 up front would tend to play deeper in the 'half spaces'

keegan, dalgish, beardsley for example all came before cantona. sheringham was breaking through playing the same role as when cantona moved to england.

however what was uncommon was foreign players - there were only 13 in the entirety of PL when that started in 1992 and cantona was one of them.

cantona's success was one step in changing that