So… listen to this… Back in 1997, when Henry was still sitting on the bench at AS Monaco, begging his coach for minutes, there was another kid… an old teammate from his academy days… 1 year younger than him, already setting the Premier League ablaze… Nicolas Anelka… Wenger said he was “the greatest discovery of his career”. . .
Houllier said he was “the best striker of his generation”… And honestly I always get the impression that at one point Anelka saw himself as the best player in the world and that was what stopped him from truly becoming it…. He seemingly couldn’t shut his mouth, always politically incorrect, he always had to have everything laid out just the way he wanted it, he couldn’t stop himself from rushing every single one of his career moves… and before you knew it, he had wrecked his career beyond repair… as he said it himself “All that i’ve done, don’t do it… you will only make enemies”. .
. It’s absurd how this guy won 2 Champions Leagues, the Euros, an Intertoto Cup, a Confederations Cup, an European Supercup and a Cup Winners Cup, that he even got nominated to the Ballon d’Or and somehow most people will still tell you that he was a massive disappointment, that he wasted his potential, that he could have been so much better… that’s how many twists and turns his career took, as Henry said “If somebody made a movie about Nico’s life, it would have more parts than Star Wars”. .
. And the first one… it started when the two first met, at the Clairefontaine academy, the most prestigious academy in France, alongside everyone from Saha to Gallas… But there, even though Henry was older, he was the one looking up to Anelka, as he would go on to admit “He was younger, but I didn’t see him like that… to me he was the biggest talent in the academy… Some were great, but he had a gift”. .
. And so after just 2 years there, PSG poached him from the academy and at 16 he was already debuting for the club… At his age, most players would have been sent on loan to a smaller team to toughen up, but Anelka was such a talent that they just knew they had to make the most of it while they had him…. When he entered the pitch for the first time the commentator literally said “Why are the camera's focusing on him?
Because he is the talent of the future”. . .
they had to enjoy it while they could… However, during the next year and a half, despite getting to share a locker room with the likes of George Weah, Raí and Ginola and even getting some serious silverware under his name, as he watched the team take the cup winners cup… 17 year old Anelka was only getting to play 20 minutes a match and while most would accept this as something normal at such a young age… Anelka didn’t… In fact it quickly became a problem for the club, as he would get furious whenever they sent him to play with the youth team but then Arsene Wenger caught wind of the situation and knowing he was yet to sign a true professional contract, he quite simply asked him to join Arsenal and he did… leaving PSG completely empty handed and causing a gigantic uproar in France, with both clubs going head to head in court, though even after winning the case, PSG would only get Arsenal to pay them a mere 600 thousand euros… However, once in London, at first, Anelka was getting even less game time than he did in Paris… As Wenger would say “he arrived thinking he was a great player as youngsters often do…but he lacked the mentality and the physicality, he had poor judgment and he lost the ball constantly…” And after all, with Ian Wright and Berkgamp at the front, it would be even harder for him to break into the starting eleven… but then he got really lucky… just picture this… It was the last match of the season and as the bus was about to depart, someone noticed Anelka was nowhere to be seen… Wenger goes back to the hotel and finds him in his room packing his bags… He asked what’s going on… he tells him he doesnt wanna play… So the manager gives him a whole speech about how his time would arrive… Anelka gives in and 9 minutes into the match, Paul Merson gets injured, Wenger subs Anelka in and the kid assists both goals and takes the man of the match award… But of course, you may say this wasn’t enough… that Ian Wright was still there… but guess what happened then? 5 months into the next season, Wright was hit with a crazy injury that put him out for the rest of the season and pretty much ended his career, allowing Anelka to swoop him and take the spotlight, putting up 11 goal contributions over the next 14 league matches, scoring in the FA Cup final, and taking Arsenal to an historic league and cup double… And if that wasn’t enough, the next year he’d take it all even further, putting up 25 goal contributions, coming just one goal short of being the league’s top scorer while ironically also finishing 1 point off of the title, but still managing to take the PFA Young Player Of The Year Award and settling himself as maybe the most promising young player on earth… And of course, to add fuel to the fire, around this time, with 8 months having gone by since he was brutally axed from France’s world cup squad only days before the tournament without ever getting an explanation, Anelka finally got another shot to play for his national team and he blew everyone’s mind, becoming the first ever frenchman to score against England at Wembley… and then doing it twice… leading Deschamps to claim “We have found our Ronaldo”. .
. At this point the logical thing to do would be to stay at Arsenal and focus on becoming the team’s star player but instead… after seeing a poll in which Arsenal fans claimed they would rather have Ian Wright back than keep Anelka, he freaked out, completely ignoring the fact obviously the fans are gonna pick the club legend who always played with a smile on his face over the new kid who’s always frowning, and then, motivated by his brothers, who were always negative influences on his career, always convincing him to follow the money and leading him to rush his decisions… he began looking for a new club… eventually admitting “I was furious with them, I left Arsenal to punish the fans”. .
. and before you knew it, Anelka was moving to Real Madrid for 35 million euros… if not for Christian Vieri’s 46 million euro transfer that same year, he would have been the most expensive player of all time… it had only been 3 months since he turned 20… However this wasn’t as great as it may seem… Had he stayed at Arsenal, his friend Henry would have joined only weeks after and with Wenger planning to make a duo out of them, who knows what could have happened… But with Anelka gone, Henry was instead used as his replacement and as he slowly became Arsenal’s greatest ever player… His success only served to make Anelka’s downfall that much more embarrassing… Because… You see… Anelka’s move was a disaster, the british media painted him as a traitor, the spanish media as a spoiled brat bound to flop… as Anelka would say “When I was a kid I never said I wanted to become a footballer, I said I wanted to become a star… But then, I finally understood what it meant to be a star at Real Madrid… and I hated it”. .
. To make matters worse, the locker room saw Anelka’s signing as a way to push Morientes out of the team and in their attempt to protect their friend, they ended up being hostile towards Anelka, they barely talked to him, they pushed him around… it was a dog eat dog world and so his move… which should’ve allowed him to showcase his talent, instead made him completely paranoid, a prisoner in his mansion, feeling like the whole world was after him and his talent was completely extinguished… 5 months later… Anelka was yet to score a single goal… He was in panic, he felt the need to justify himself… And then, like a predator, the newspaper Marca called him to their offices, they pretended to be his friends, got him to play FIFA and the next day the cover was a photo of him with the caption “Anelka finally scores… on playstation”. .
. . His paranoia was justified… Nothing served as better proof that the environment in Spain was completely toxic to Anelka than the fact that once Real traveled to Brazil for the club world cup, then feeling more relaxed and honestly safer… Anelka put down 3 goals in 3 matches, becoming the top scorer of the tournament….
However, if there was any hope that he’d be able to hold on to this momentum and carry it over to the regular season… a six week long injury made sure to kill most of it… While Anelka made sure to get rid of what remained, by getting angry that the board refused to talk about his lack of playing time, boycotting training, telling the press everyone at the club “treated him like a dog” and being handed a 45 day suspension… As it seemed his signing was bound to be remembered as one of the worst in history… fate hit Anelka with a bit of irony, as after going 35 league matches with only 1 goal… he was given the chance to start in both Champions League semi final matches against Bayern and made sure to score twice to put Real one step away from what would be their 7th Champions League title… Regardless, no silver lining could make up for what had happened… Anelka didn’t shy away and called this “the biggest mistake of my life”. . .
With his spirits hitting all time lows, the Euros in the summer only served to make him feel worse, as even though France won the whole thing with Anelka even assisting the goal that would put them in the final…. He had been struggling with fitness throughout the whole thing and ended up being benched for the decisive match, leading him to claim that “I was part of it, but I didn’t contribute to anything… if i could strip that award from my record i would”. .
. . If it sounds like he was being too harsh on himself, let me tell you that at the end of the year, he’d be nominated for the Ballon D’Or… Feeling lost and unwanted, Anelka resorted to the biggest cliché in the sport and decided to move back to where it all started… joining PSG where everyone welcomed with cheers and open arms, even being handed the captain’s armband straight away… as they broke the league’s all time transfer record, in hopes of building their project around the man himself… He had just lost a battle but he was being welcomed home like a hero… But It only felt like a fairy tale….
until it didn’t… You see, at first, PSG promised Anelka they’d build a new team with a new philosophy centered around exploring the many talents that had spawned from the suburbs of Paris, kids like him… B ut only 3 months in, as soon as the first string of bad results hit the club, the board freaked out, sacked the manager and completely went back on their word, upsetting Anelka because, after all, not only did the results not improve following the managerial change, but he had been promised a completely different project… And of course with Anelka upset… his numbers dropped tremendously… From 11 goals in the first half of the season, to just 3 in the second… leading him to publicly blame the coach… Add to this a disappointing, even if victorious, performance at the Confederations Cup and by the time Anelka was back for his second season, it was obvious his days were yet again numbered… And so, with only 2 more goals over the next 6 months, Anelka began forcing his way out, eventually settling for a loan move to Liverpool… Look… out of all his moves this one upsets me especially… Because, you see… It went well… Anelka pulled some decent numbers, he seemed happy, the fans loved him, the coach was Gerard Houllier, a Frenchman who clearly wanted what was best for him and had already coached him back when he was a kid… but in the end… Houllier heard that Anelka’s brothers were in contact with other clubs and even though Anelka would go on to state that he all he wanted was to stay at Liverpool, neither of the two took the step to talk to each other and agree to ignore whatever shenanigans Anelka’s brothers were trying to pull… and by the time they realized this… it was too late… Anelka had already found his 4th transfer in 5 years… Joining Manchester City, who at the time were just a recently promoted club that had no business signing a guy who just two years earlier was on the Ballon D’Or list… It was almost embarrassing… Regardless of how well it went, with Anelka often getting close to the top of the premier league’s goal scorers table… Well… you only had to look at Henry to see how much of a let down this was… While he led Arsenal to an invincible season, nearly winning the Ballon D’Or… Anelka was struggling with City, only avoiding relegation by an inch… And to make things worse, the same happened with the national team, while Henry was having an incredible year with 18 goal contributions for france in just 14 matches, Anelka had largely been forgotten ever since 2001 and even when the manager paid him a visit in England to try and get him back, instead of being realistic and understanding, Anelka got offended when the coach claimed he “didn’t know him too well”. . .
reacting angrily and eventually telling the press he would never play for France again, saying the coach would have to “get down on his knees” in order to convince him… It was already awful to see him act like such a prima donna then but it only became more embarrassing when a year later, he went back on his word, apologized to the manager, spoke publicly about wanting to return… only for the manager to ignore him completely… And sure, at least, as he went into his third year at the club, you could argue that at least he had found stability, but even that was ruined once City began struggling financially, being forced to find somewhere they could send Anelka to… eventually landing him at Fenerbahce…. Many thought this was the end, but instead, even with injuries stopping his progress, even with the manager moving him off to the wing… Anelka suddenly seemed different… He was getting as many assists as goals, he was Fenerbahce main playmaker… It was uncanny… Even Zidane began pleading for France to bring him to the world cup… But even though he did come back, he once again missed the world cup in favor of Sidney Govou… yeah… Regardless, he still had a chance to capitalize on all of his momentum and secure a move back to a top team… so he joined Bolton… Sure, Okocha had been there, so had Fernando Hierro and Jardel… but they all arrived when their careers were dying out, not when they seemed bound to make it to the top… But just like with Fenerbahce, even after 11 matches in England without a goal… people were wrong once more… Though it seemed bad at first, with this move Anelka had put himself right in front of every English top club and after that poor start, he went on a run that saw him get 31 goal contributions in 38 matches, convincing Chelsea to put down an impressive 18 million for his signing, hoping Anelka would be able to make up for the absence of Drgba, Kanu and Essien while the three were out for the African Cup Of Nations…. but instead… Anelka sort of took over… becoming Drgba’s main supplier, averaging an assist around every 130 minutes and even assisting the goal that would put Chelsea on the Champions League final… However, as it seemed like things had finally gone full circle, with Anelka once again at the top of the footballing world, the responsibility of scoring the penalty that would define their season fell upon him .
. . and he missed… handing rivals Manchester United the Champions League trophy… and allowing Chelsea to go trophyless, finishing 2nd in 4 out of the 5 competitions they were involved in… Knowing Anelka this could have destroyed him mentally, after all he did say that “Missing that penalty made me feel like a traitor, i arrived mid season, i had no business being there…it killed me”.
. . but for once, instead of running away, he pushed back harder than ever and ended up playing the season of his career, starting the year with 13 goal contributions in 13 matches in Drgba’s absence, then slowing down a bit but still totalling 34 contributions in total, including 19 league goals, making him the premier league top scorer, ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo himself… At 30 years of age, Anelka had finally proved he could go head to head with one of the greats… that he himself was great… but still, you got the feeling that he could go even further….
but instead things went wrong once more… After one more good season, taking the league and cup double… Anelka was called up for the world cup… it was the perfect moment to define his legacy… one incredible tournament and he could forever be remembered as a legend… However before it all even started, Anelka was already threatening to quit, he said he “felt something bad was coming”. . .
