Samuel Eto'o vs Didier Drogba: Who is Africa's GREATEST Striker?

Of all the great football talent that the continent of Africa has produced over the generations, there are two in particular who just had a gift for scoring goals. For both their club and country, you could rely on them to perform no matter how big the occasion. Samuel Eto'o and Didier Drogba are some of the greatest players to ever represent the African continent. And since they played the exact same position in similar eras, it begs the question, just who was the better player? What's going on guys, it's Raymar and today, we're looking at Samuel Eto'o versus Didier Drogba. Who is Africa's greatest player? Now, you're probably wondering, Raymar, why would you decide to make this video and put two African kings against each other? Well, earlier this year, former Liverpool and Senegal forward El Hadji Diouf claimed to be the best striker to walk the continent of Africa. Which in turn caused Samuel Eto'o to say, And it's not the fact that I say it, it's a fact. I wanted to be number one and I have been throughout my career. Eto'o also went to imply that Diouf must have been drunk when he made that claim, so he'd forgive him. Personally, I thought it was pretty common consensus that Samuel Eto'o is the greatest African player of all time. But on social media, especially Twitter, I'm seeing so many people say that Drogba was a better player. So I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to objectively look at who had a better career. In order to assess which of these two was the better player, we have to look at different aspects of their career, individual performance, accolades and awards, style of play, and since football is a team sport, team success as well. Didier Drogba, while playing for many different clubs throughout his career, is most known for his time in the Premier League with Chelsea. But before that, he would begin his career in the French Second Division League for a few years until he helped his second club Guingamp almost single-handedly avoid relegation and placed the highest it has ever been on the French league table. This in turn would attract interest from much more established clubs in the nation until he finally had his breakout year in the 2004-2005 season at the age of 24 that saw him gain attention in no other than France's Ligue 1, playing for Marseille, where he would score 32 goals in 55 appearances, an impressive 0.58 goals per game ratio, earning him the Ligue 1 Player of the Year award and global attention as a clinical forward that you could rely on to get the ball in the back of the net. Only staying with the club for a single season, Chelsea had immediately looked to sign him, making it their highest transfer fee ever spent at the time of 24 million euros. His first season for Chelsea saw him only scoring 16 goals in 41 appearances, but nevertheless managed to help Chelsea win the Premier League title. He would score the same amount of goals again in the same amount of matches played while helping Chelsea earn back-to-back Premier League titles the following season. And finally, in 2006, Drogba would have his second best season for Chelsea, where he scored in the FA Cup Final against Manchester United and both their goals in the 2-0 win over Arsenal for the League Cup Final, ending the season with 33 goals in 30 appearances, a 0.55 goals per game ratio. Drogba's best year for Chelsea was in the 2009-2010 season, where he would score 37 goals in a monstrous 0.84 goals per game ratio, while winning the Premier League title and once again scoring in the FA Cup Final and Community Shield Finals, which resulted in Drogba scoring in all six Premier League finals he made appearances in so far, giving him the nickname of the ultimate big-time player and ending the best performance in his career with the Premier League golden boot. In the last season of his first stint with Chelsea, Drogba would score 13 goals in 35 appearances and while it wasn't anything amazing, he would score in the FA Final yet again, as well as score the only goal in Chelsea's first-leg win against Barcelona in the Champions League semi-final. But most importantly, he would score an equalizing header in the Champions League Final against Bayern Munich to save Chelsea from defeat, where he would be the one to score the game-winning penalty shootout to win the Champions League title. Sir Alex Ferguson would say, as far as I'm concerned, Drogba won the Champions League for Chelsea. Being named In his 20-year career, Drogba would score 300 goals and have 124 assists in 686 appearances, having a goal-scoring ratio of .44 goals a game and winning four Premier League titles, four FA Cups, one Champions League title, having one FIFA World XI appearance, one Ligue 1 Player of the Year award, two Premier League golden boots, leading the Premier League in Samuel Eto'o began his career in Real Madrid's youth program, where he would have a slow start being loaned out to a few teams where he'd bounce around and wouldn't be used much. However, when Mallorca gave him a chance, they saw a lot of potential in the 19-year-old Eto'. After 13 appearances and 6 goals, Mallorca were convinced that he could be something and decided to permanently sign him from Real Madrid. In his time with Mallorca, Eto'o would be honed into a lethal striker that could come up in big matches, as he scored two goals in the 2002-2003 Copa del Rey final to secure the trophy. In the four seasons with Mallorca, he would score 70 goals in 142 appearances, which was a pretty good average considering he was only 23 years old. These few years would be important development time for Eto'o, as, like he stated, he felt like he was well looked after by the club and appreciated by the fans. Sometimes a player just needs that positive environment to blossom into their full potential. This was when Eto'o would move to Barcelona and his career would blow up. His first season alone would see an incredible jump in performances, with 29 goals in 45 games, a .65 goals per game ratio, helping his club reach the top of the table and win his first La Liga title, along with being the joint top scorer in Spain. It was then on that Eto'o's true potential was unlocked. Under a good club and a good system, he was a lethal goal scorer. The next season would be the best in Eto'o's career. He would score a monstrous 34 goals and 10 assists in 47 games, an incredibly good .72 goals per game ratio, helping Barcelona win a minor treble with a Champions League title, in which Eto'o came up big and scored an equalizing goal in the final, the La Liga title, and the Spanish Super Cup title. Eto'o was voted as the UEFA Forward of the Year and finished 3rd in the FIFA World Player of the Year voting, behind teammates Ronaldinho and Messi, being the only African since George Weah to finish in the top three, which one could argue he could've deserved 2nd place in. And in the 2008-2009 season, Eto'o would once again come up big as he scored 36 goals in 52 appearances, an incredible .69 goals per game ratio, helping Barcelona win a full treble, where he would once again come up big and score a game-winning goal against Real Valladolid, which helped Barcelona advance 1 point of Real Madrid to win the La Liga title, also scored in the Champions League final against Manchester United, and helped Barcelona win the Copa del Rey, coming in incredibly clutch for the club, scoring a total of 130 goals, having a goal-scoring ratio of .65 goals a game throughout his 5 years at Barcelona. In Inter Milan, Eto'o's first year would see him as the first and only player to ever win consecutive trebles with two different teams, as he won the Serie A title, Italian Super Cup, and Champions League title, placing 5th in the 2009 Ballon d'Or voting. Eto'o would also have another monstrous season where he would have the highest goals scored in his career, with 37 goals in 54 appearances, having a .69 goals per game ratio yet again, winning every possible award you could at club level, and in two different top leagues at that. Eto'o's club career saw him scoring a total of 371 goals and getting 116 assists in 764 games, a goal-scoring ratio of .49 throughout a 22-year career, seeing him win the FIFA World Player of the Year Bronze Award for 3rd place, two UEFA Team of the Year appearances, two FIFA World XI appearances, one UEFA Forward of the Year award, three Champions League titles, led the Champions League in assists in 2006, three La Liga titles, two Copa del Rey, two Spanish Super Cups, one Serie A title, two Copa Italias, one Italian Super Cup, and one FIFA Club World Cup. Now let's look at their national team careers. Samuel Eto'o played for the Cameroon national team for a total of 19 years, scoring 56 goals in 118 appearances, with his best year being in 2008 with 11 goals in 11 appearances. Eto'o would make history as a 16-year-old by playing in the 1998 World Cup for his country, the youngest appearance for any player in the competition. Eto'o would win his first African Cup of Nations as an 18-year-old in 2000 and win again as a 20-year-old in 2002. In the 2006 Cup of Nations, Eto'o was the tournament's top goalscorer and finished as runner-ups for the tournament. The 2008 Cup of Nations saw Eto'o make history as he surpassed the record of the tournament's all-time goals scored and once again would end up scoring the most goals in the tournament, making him the leading goalscorer in two consecutive Cup of Nations. Samuel Eto'o won the African Player of the Year a total of four times, being the first player to ever do so when he won them in 2003, 2004, 2005 with a three-peat, and finally in 2010. Which honestly is a surprise to me as Eto'o definitely should have won at least one more, especially in 2006 seeing as he had an amazing performance. On the other hand, Didier Drogba played for the Ivory Coast national team for a total of 13 years, scoring 65 goals in 105 appearances. Drogba helped his country qualify for their very first World Cup, playing a pivotal role in helping his country make a ceasefire during the Ivorian Civil War of 2002 by passionately pleading to his country in front of camera to unify together. Incredibly amazing and much bigger than football if you ask me. He would also score the very first goal ever for his country in the 2006 World Cup. Drogba would appear in two Africa Cup of Nations finals but has never managed to actually go all the way and win, which in contrast to Eto'o, has had a teammate who won four African Player of the Years himself in Yaya Toure, having undoubtedly a better teammate than Eto'o has ever had in Cameroon. Drogba has, however, been named the African Player of the Year twice in 2006 and 2009. As for style of play, the two forwards are considerably different. Samuel Eto'o was one of the fastest players in the world during his prime and was one of the best finishers in his position. And probably the most notable part about Eto'o's style of play was his adaptability and compatibility. In Barcelona, he played as a central forward but in Inter Milan, he would often play as a winger. Additionally, Eto'o was able to complement any playstyle due to his well-known intelligence in positioning and movement, making it easy for him to build chemistry with different players and Unlike most strikers in his time, Eto'o had amazing dribbling on top of his lethal finishing, having some of the most amazing touches I've seen from a striker. Most of all, he was incredibly consistent no matter what team he went to and how old he got, scoring nearly half of every game he has ever played. In comparison, while Eto'o is also known for scoring in Champions League finals, Drogba is more known for scoring in big games, having scored 10 goals in the 10 finals he's Having incredible strength and clinical finishing. Drogba might not have been the fastest forward, but he had good positioning and can hold his own against rough and overly physical defenders. Drogba was also better in the air than Eto'o, with his more physical stature benefiting him at finishing near goal. If we look at their careers as a whole, Eto'o has objectively been more successful, scoring more goals at a more efficient rate and winning more trophies. I also had the opportunity to watch both players and at least to me, while Drogba did score some iconic and big time goals, Eto'o was just much more amazing to watch. Seeing him dribbling the ball, easily running past defenders and bending the ball around the keeper was truly a sight. Eto'o to me also should have been 3rd in Ballon d'Or voting the same year he won 3rd in the FIFA Player of the Year award, being one of the most important players in Barcelona's mid to late 2000s domination. But people should really recognize just how great Samuel Eto'o was, as I barely see him get enough recognition. He definitely had the right to say what he did. But that's all from me today guys, this video was made possible by Aleric Aguilar, Owen Torres, King Kev, Nakam and the rest of my Patrons. 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