Ivorian football star Didier Drogba is well known for his prolific scoring as a forward for Chelsea, as well as for being captain of the Côte d’Ivoire national team for the last decade. Drogba has the distinction of being highest goal-scorer of any foreign player in the Premier League, and was even voted the best Chelsea player by supporters of the club in 2012. Here are 17 things you didn’t know about Didier Drogba.
Drogba’s mother, Name, nicknamed him “Tito” after President Broz Tito of Yugoslavia, whom she greatly admired.
At age 5, Drogba was sent to live with his professional footballer uncle, Michel Goba, in France. He returned to his family in Abidjan three years later after becoming homesick, but moved back to France after both his parents lost their jobs as bank workers.
Drogba’s parents moved to Antony, a suburb of Paris, in 1993. He moved back in with them and his siblings, and began playing football on a more frequent basis.
From 1998-2002, Drogba played in the second division of the French football club Le Mans. The four years were fraught with injury, but it was also his first professional contract, and a rung on the ladder to higher prospects.
After Le Mans, Didier transferred to Ligue 1 soccer club Guingamp, and his record goals attracted Marseille, who bought him for £3.3 million pounds. During his year of playing for Marseille, he scored 19 goals and won the National Union of Professional Footballers Player of the Year Award.
In the summer of 2004, Drogba signed a contract with Chelsea for $40 million. He turned out to be worth it, though, as he helped the club win its first league title in 50 years.
In 2012, a poll of 20,000 fans administered by the Chelsea club’s official magazine named Didier Drogba the team’s greatest player ever.
Drogba’s two younger brothers, Joël and Freddy Drogba, are also footballers. Freddy plays for the French Ligue Youth 1 side Dijon.
In March 2012, he scored his 100th premier league goal in a victory over Stoke City, becoming the 22nd player ever, and the first African, to do so.
In the 117th minute of the 2008 Champions League final, Drogba slapped Manchester United defender Nemanja Vidic. Chelsea went on to lose the game in penalties after Capt. John Terry took Drogba’s place in the shootout and missed.
In the summer of 2012, Drogba officially left Chelsea to play for the Chinese Super League Shanghai Shenhua, playing for reportedly £200,000 a week. He played on the field until the end of the year.
In January of 2013, Drogba signed on with Turkey’s Galatasaray Süper Lig for a one-and-a-half year contract. His earnings were steep: €15,000 per match, with a sign-on fee of €4 million and €4 million per season.
Just this month (July of 2014), Didier proclaimed his return to Chelsea by signing a one-year contract. He stated: “Everyone knows the special relationship I have with this club and it has always felt like home to me.” (Wikipedia). He will resume with the number 15 on his shirt, which he sported in 2004 when he first started playing for the club.
Didier married Diakite Lalla, his long-time partner, on June 11, 2011 in a private ceremony in Monaco, well-attended by club owner Roman Abramovich and some say Akon. The pair have three sons together.
After Côte d’Ivoire qualified for the 2006 FIFA World Cup, Drogba made a public plea to armed combatants in his country to lay down arms during the tail end of the civil war.
Due to his charity work and involvement in the peace process in Côte d’Ivoire, the U.N. Development Program named Drogba goodwill ambassador to bring more attention to issues in West Africa, and to support the millennium development goals across the world.
Drogba decided on the foundation’s initial direction after visiting hospitals in his home town. ”I decided the foundation’s first project should be to build and fund a hospital giving people basic healthcare and a chance just to stay alive.”
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