Xavier Chen (; born 5 October 1983) is a former professional footballer who played as a right-back. He began his youth career with Anderlecht before moving to KV Kortrijk where he first played at senior level (2003–2007). After Kortrijk, he spent six years at KV Mechelen (2007–2013) and two at Guizhou Renhe (2013–2015) before returning to KV Mechelen. Born in Belgium, he represented Chinese Taipei at international level.
Personal life
Chen was born to a French mother and a Taiwanese father. His paternal grandfather is a former diplomat who still lives in Taiwan.
Club career
Chen started his senior career in KV Kortrijk, but gained recognition in his first stint with KV Mechelen, where he became captain. Due to the inconvenience of traveling back and forth between Belgium and Taiwan, Chen decided to move to Chinese side Guizhou Renhe when he accepted CTFA's invitation to play for the national team. In January 2016, Chen returned to KV Mechelen, stating that he only wanted to play for a maximum of three years in China. A few Chinese teams showed interest to sign him, but he ultimately decided to return to his country of birth. Altogether, Chen spent seven seasons with KV Mechelen.
International career
Chen's eligibility to play for Chinese Taipei was discovered by the CTFA public relations director Chen Chia-Ming in 2009 and Chen was invited to play for the national team. The Chinese Football Association of the mainland had also made an attempt to recruit Chen three months after the CTFA did. On 24 May 2011, encouraged by his relatives, Chen elected to play for Chinese Taipei.
Chen made his international debut against Malaysia on 3 July 2011 and scored the winning goal. This marked the first time in 10 years that Chinese Taipei beat an opponent that was ranked in the FIFA top 150. The attendance of the game was a record breaking at 15,335, which was 10,000 higher than average. On 9 October 2015, Chen scored the third goal in a 5–1 victory over Macau.
International goals
Scores and results list Taiwan's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Chen goal.