From Ligue 1 to superstardom: George Weah

Football was never the be-all and end-all for George Weah, but rather something that would set him on the path to greater things.

He grew up on a reclaimed swamp on Liberia’s Bushrod Island during a period of serious political unrest. He witnessed assassinations first-hand as his country suffered decades of war.

His talent was clear from a very early age and he joined the aptly named local Clara town club Young Survivors in his early teens. He scored by the bucket-load, both at home and then in Cameroon, but the real goal was always to get out.

The chance came in 1988 when Monaco coach Arsene Wenger brought him to Ligue 1. "A friend of mine was working in Africa and I asked him whether he had seen any strikers,” Wenger recalled to the Arsenal website. 

"He recommended George and I sent somebody over there to watch him. We brought him over for £50,000 and it took him a while to adapt, but he was ambitious, talented, had great hunger for work and I worked a lot with him".

It was the chance Weah had been waiting for, and one for which he is eternally grateful.

"Every time I went on to on the field, I was playing for Wenger,” he told FIFA TV. "I wanted him to know that what he had done for me, this is the way I could pay him. I would break my knee, my hand, my face for him just to win the game. He took care of me like a son.”

It would be the start of a European adventure that would bring unprecedented success, culminating in major titles in France, Italy and Spain. Weah would also become the first, and only, African to be named FIFA World Player of the Year – and would give the award to Wenger, the man who made it all possible.

It took a little while to adapt to the rigours of a new league, a new continent and a new life, but he hit a stunning 17 goals in his first season in Europe and was immediately named African Player of the Year. 

Plenty more followed and in 1991, alongside the likes of Franck Sauzee, Emmanuel Petit, Ramon Diaz, Claude Puel and Rui Barrios, Weah inspired the club to the Coupe de France.

In the last of his four seasons in Monaco he hit 23 goals and it was time to make the next step on his journey as Paris Saint-Germain brought him to the French capital. The goals continued to flow, and so did the titles: A second Coupe de France was followed by a Ligue 1 title.

All the while, a young Thierry Henry had looked on in awe. “I have never seen pace and power like George Weah,” he said.

The French top flight could no longer contain him and Weah headed for Italy after three wildly successful years with PSG, joining AC Milan in 1995. After hitting 84 goals in 2014 Ligue 1 games, Weah became a Serie A legend and, within a year of his arrival on the peninsula, was named African Player of the Century. But already he was showing signs that much greater things lay ahead. 

With his home country still reeling from war, Weah became the on-field and off-field leader of the Liberian national team, reportedly spending millions of dollars of his own money on logistics as the country came close to making its first ever World Cup in 2002.

After his playing days came to an end, Weah went back to school, earning a degree in business and a Master’s in public administration. He ran for president in 2005 and made it to the second round of voting, where he earned 40% of the vote as he missed out to Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

The man Nelson Mandela once labelled, "the pride of Africa," was made a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador in 1997 and has valiantly fought the spread of HIV/AIDS and worked to rehabilitate child soldiers.

In 2014 he was appointed a member of the Liberian senate and this year confirmed he is making another run at the presidency in 2017.

Schooled in Ligue 1, Weah went on to conquer the football world. But his sporting success was merely a stepping stone towards his considerably more important goal of making the wider world a better place for all.