LE2: Didier Drogba, Chelsea, Topps Match Attax Trading Card Game, Barclays Premier League 2010/11 Collector Binder

The new Premier League season is less than a week away and, as always, clubs will be entering the campaign with the baggage of hope, expectation and new challenges to overcome. As hilarious as it was to watch it is unlikely that the plucky underdogs of Manchester City will be quite as inept this time around while Arsenal will look to avoid yet another season of near misses. Nottingham Forest and Crystal Palace will have the added burden of European football while Tottenham Hotspur have turned to Thomas Frank to spearhead their Champions League jaunt with a clear remit to avoid finishing seventeenth however comical it might be. Reigning champions Liverpool, meanwhile, have endured a horrific summer following the tragic death of Diogo Jota which highlighted that none of this really matters in the grand scheme of things.

Chelsea enter the season with a potential target on their backs following their summer exploits in the USA. Although they have been denied the physical evidence, owing to Donald Trump’s need to have something shiny to distract him in the Oval Office, the Blues are officially the best football club in the world (if you count success in needlessly overblown pre-season friendly FIFA vanity projects). While they missed out on domestic honours they picked up the Europa (Vauxhall) Conference League trophy alongside the inaugural FIFA Club World Cup off the back of a 3-0 victory over reigning European champions Paris Saint-Germain. Their dominant performance in the final impressed many pundits and allowed Cole Palmer to somewhat dispel questions over his performances in supposedly “big games” while the tournament as a whole allowed new boys Liam Delap and Joao Pedro to acclimatise to their new colleagues.  

Since the arrival of Roman Abramovich’s giant chequebook there have been a lot of “big games” for the Blues. Between his arrival in June 2003 and his departure in May 2022 Chelsea appeared in nineteen major finals (along with several Community Shield and Super Cup games) as well as winning five Premier League titles. At the core of much of this success was Ivorian striker Didier Drogba. Across nine seasons and two spells at Stamford Bridge he scored 164 goals making him the club’s leading all-time non-English goalscorer. Nine of these goals came in cup finals including winners in the 2007, 2010 and 2012 FA Cup, 2007 League Cup and the decisive penalty in the 2012 Champions League final shootout. As one of Jose Mourinho’s first signings he more than fulfilled his brief to bring silverware to South West London and successfully saw off threats to his first team place from the likes of Mateja Kezman, Andriy Shevchenko, Claudio Pizarro and Henrique Hilario (although the latter might have been hyped up somewhat in a classic act of Mourinho shithousery).

It is no surprise that Drogba was a commanding presence on the pitch who was unafraid to stand up for himself against opponents, referees and in post-match interviews. During his debut season at Stamford Bridge he courted controversy by suggesting he sometimes made more of contact from opponents to gain free kicks. The British sporting press being the wonderfully balanced and welcoming thing it is was quick to seize on this and propagate the kind of bollocks Jim Beglin often came out with during Champions League commentary about “foreign players”. In the final of the aforementioned European trophy in 2008 he was sent off for slapping Manchester United’s Nemanja Vidic and later stated in his autobiography that "If I had punched him, I would have understood [the sending off]. Now I wish I had." This led to an FA investigation into Drogba’s perceived promotion of violence with some armchair critics drawing parallels with Roy Keane’s revelation of his intentional dismembering of Alf Inge Haaland. A year later he received a six match ban from the same competition after loudly describing referee Tom Henning Ovrebo’s performance as “a f***ing disgrace” into the camera following the Blues’ loss to Barcelona in the semi-finals. Watching as a neutral Drogba might have had a point as demonstrated by the borderline riot that kicked off in the Lemon Grove at the University of Exeter following the final whistle. A particular highlight from this was someone lobbing a chair at the President of the Student Union who had turned up with five minutes left wearing a Barca shirt.

While Drogba’s comments may have kicked off conflict at probably the best university in the world/Exeter that night they had a very different impact in arguably the biggest game of his career. In October 2005 the Ivory Coast beat Sudan to qualify for their maiden World Cup. This significant achievement came three years after the outbreak of civil war in the country and, sensing an opportunity, Drogba brought the cameras to the dressing room where he delivered an impassioned speech urging his compatriots to forgive their enemies and take to the ballot box as “we want to have fun so stop firing your guns”. The following year the elections took place without bloodshed and, while the Elephants were eliminated from 2006’s ‘group of death’, their efforts played a major part in uniting a nation. As the country healed in the following years Drogba urged both political and footballing leaders to move a key qualifier against Madagascar to the former rebel stronghold Bouake rather than the capital Abidjan. On top of this the striker donated huge sums towards the construction of vital infrastructure including schools and hospitals. Besides his huge impact off the pitch Drogba also finished his career as his country’s leading all-time goalscorer with 65 goals in 105 appearances.

Didier Drogba’s performances in “big games” for club and country mean he is rightly remembered as one of the best players of his generation. As well as the aforementioned silverware he was also twice named African Footballer of the Year, featured in numerous teams of the year and won awards for both the quantity and quality of his goals across the world. However many players the current Chelsea owners sign it’s hard to imagine them happening upon anyone who will have such a huge impact on the club’s success and it’s worth noting that the Ivory Coast have not qualified for the World Cup since his retirement. More importantly, perhaps, it’s unlikely that they’ll stumble across one who will have such a positive influence on healing a divided nation. Good luck Cole Palmer.