I scouted Didier Drogba for Premier League club before he joined Chelsea – then they got relegated

Didier Drogba was scouted by another Premier League club before moving to Chelsea.

The striker had even been persuaded to join, but his admirers had to drop out.

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Drogba first moved to Chelsea from Marseille in 2004 and went on to play twice for the club.

During his two spells at Stamford Bridge he scored 104 goals in 254 league games.

The Ivorian also won 14 trophies, including the Champions League and four league titles.

He was also the top scorer in the Premier League twice.

However, it could have been another London club, revealed former scout Paul Montgomery.

He told Shaun Custis and Henry Winter exclusively on Sunday Edition that he scouted Drogba for West Ham when he was playing for French club Guingamp.

Montgomery had also been watching his future Chelsea star Florent Malouda.

Asked if he spotted Drogba, he explained: “I was looking at Malouda and then the big man was on the bench.”

“I came on for 20 minutes in the first game and thought ‘Oof’ when I looked through my files again.

“I had seen him before at Le Mans and noted him as ‘keep an eye on him’ and because they had their own database back then.

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“Then I went back for the next game and came on for 30 minutes and then they played Lyon who were top of the league and I always liked a player at Lyon called Edmilson who I later took to Newcastle along with Sam Allardyce tried to get.” .

“He captained Lyon for four years, then captained Barcelona for four years and then captained Brazil.”

“He was great and I thought I’d go to this game because they were playing Guingamp and were leading 2-0 at half-time.”

“A big man comes off the bench in the second half, shoots one, makes one. I was like, ‘Oh, aye aye,’ and I remember going back and traveling back and if you’re someone like me and you see something like that, it’s so different, it’s different.

Montgomery even convinced Drogba to join the Hammers, but they were relegated at the end of the 2002/03 season.

Under interim coach Trevor Brooking they finished 18th, two points clear.

As a result, Drogba instead moved to Marseille for just £5 million before moving to Chelsea a year later.

The Hammers also missed out on Malouda, who moved to Lyon and then Chelsea in 2007.