Brazilian Icon Snubs Messi, Adds Super Eagles Legend to List of Greatest Players Who Wore No.10 Jersey
- Austin Okocha is among Ronaldinho's favourite players to wear the No. 10 shirt during his playing career for club and country
- The former Brazilian midfielder who played alongside Jay Jay at Paris Saint-Germain admitted he learnt some skills from the Nigerian legend
- Okocha won bronze for Nigeria at the Atlanta 96' Olympics Games and captained Nigeria to two World Cup tournaments
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Austin Okocha's exceptional dribbling talent has been admired by players and fans all over the world and one of his biggest supporters is the legendary Ronaldinho, says Soccernet.
The pair were once teammates during their playing careers are Ligue 1 giants Paris Saint-Germain before Okocha left to play for Bolton Wanderers after the 2002 World Cup.
And the 2002 World Player of the Year once commented on his social media handle in 2017 that Okocha and Colombian legend Carlos Valderrama were two of his biggest No.10s.
Source: UGC
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"Only shirt 10 that I always admired."
Okocha became a jewel to fans with his dribbling skills similar to that of Ronaldinho and the former Barcelona star admitted he learnt a lot from the Nigerian legend during their time together in France.
Okocha's notable display for the national team
Jay Jay was first noticed at the 1994 AFCON tournament will beautiful displays against Cote d'Ivoire in the semi-final and with Zambia in the final.
During the 1994 World Cup in the United States, Okocha became the toast of the fans following his brilliant individual performance during the 2-1 against Italy.
He was among the Dream Team squad that won Africa's first gold medal at the Atalanta 96' Olympic games.
The ex-Frankfurt midfielder also starred at the France 98' World Cup helping Nigeria record a famous win over Spain at the group stage and entertaining the fans in the 4-1 loss to Denmark in the last 16.
Okocha captained Nigeria and was among the top scorers at the 2004 Nations Cup in Tunisia where he netted the tournament's 1,000th goal.
Meanwhile, Briefly News reported that Barcelona can now heave a sigh of relief after Lionel Messi appears to have agreed to take a pay cut before re-joining them on a five-year deal this summer.
The Copa America champion has been without a club since his contract with the Catalans expired in June with some top European outfits already hoping they can sign him for free.
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Source: Briefly News
Kelly Lippke (Senior Editor) Kelly Lippke is a copy editor/proofreader who started her career at the Northern-Natal Courier with a BA in Communication Science/Psychology (Unisa, 2007). Kelly has worked for several Caxton publications, including the Highway Mail and Northglen News. Kelly’s unique editing perspective stems from an additional major in Linguistics. Kelly joined Briefly News in 2018 and she has 14 years of experience. Kelly has also passed a set of trainings by Google News Initiative. You can reach her at kelly.lippke@briefly.co.za.
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