Odion Ighalo went from dodging bullets to rivalling Cristiano Ronaldo

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Former Manchester United forward Odion Ighalo was forced to contend with a harsh upbringing before his rise to footballing stardom, which currently sees him battling Cristiano Ronaldo for the golden boot in Saudi Arabia. Ighalo, who currently plays for Al-Hilal, made a name for himself in English football during his time at Watford before returning to the Premier League with United on loan in 2021.

The striker has also excelled at international level for Nigeria, scoring 16 goals in 37 games for his country over the years, and is currently an early contender for the golden boot in the Saudi Pro League after finding the net three times in as many appearances. Ronaldo, meanwhile, has scored eight goals in just five league games since joining Al-Nassr.

It has not all been plain sailing for Ighalo, though, with the 33-year-old making it through inner-city hardship in Africa before his football career took off. He previously revealed that he used to train with bullets flying over his head as police chased drug dealers across the pitch during his time growing up in Lagos, where his mother worked up to 17 hours a day selling soft drinks to pay for her son’s football boots.

He told The Mirror: “I come from the ghetto where there was no 24-hour electricity, no good water, bad roads and the neighbourhood is tough,” he said. “We used to kick old cans, plastic bottles, sometimes even an orange, around the streets in bare feet.

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“Whatever I go on to achieve in football, I will always give thanks to God for this opportunity to live my dream but I will also never forget where I came from. Ajegunle [a district in Lagos] is where my journey began and I’m proud of that. My first team, Olodi Warriors, used to play on a grass pitch known locally as the ‘Maracana’ but it was really a big, wide-open field.

“On one corner there were boys selling marijuana and they were always being chased by the police when they cut across the pitch. We would hit the floor when we heard the ‘pop, pop, pop’ of gunfire and then continue training. It’s part of life, but bullets don’t always know who are the footballers and who are the bad guys.”

Ighalo also explained that he ate snow upon seeing it for the very first time after joining Norwegian club Lyn Oslo as a teenager, with the move from sunny Nigeria to chilly Scandinavia coming as a major culture shock.

“There were three players from Nigeria who went to Norway, but one of them had to go home because he could not cope with the cold,” added Ighalo. “I could easily have followed him, but when I thought of the hardship I left behind, I was not going to cut and run.

“I had never seen snow before in Nigeria. The first time it snowed in Oslo I was like a child. I was eating it, rubbing it on my head, throwing it in the air like confetti. It was a new toy.”

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