Hidden Gems FC: Didier Drogba, Luca Toni and football's top 10 late bloomers
Anyone that manages to carve out a career for themselves in professional football is ridiculously talented. The standard at the highest level is just so high that it is simply impossible to 'fake it 'til you make it'. However, not everyone is as prodigiously gifted as Lionel Messi or Lamine Yamal. Your average player will require some time to get to grips with the rigours of the elite game.
And then there are the guys that take everyone by surprise by going from journeymen to superstars in their mid-to-late-20s. Below, GOAL counts down the game's most spectacular late bloomers, starting with a fairy-tale rise from the factor floor to Premier League legend…
Getty/GOAL10Jamie Vardy
After being released by hometown club Sheffield Wednesday at 15, Vardy ended up working at Trulife, a carbon fibre factory, while earning £30 a week playing for Stocksbridge Park Steels. By the age of 23, he'd long since given up on ever turning pro.
His career began to take off, though, after being picked up Halifax Town in the summer of 2010, with Vardy enjoying a prolific year at The Shay that earned him a move to Fleetwood Town, who were playing in the fifth tier of English football at the time. Vardy enjoyed an even better debut season with The Fisherman in the Conference Premier and was signed by Championship outfit Leicester City at the age of 25.
The rest of his story is known to almost everyone, with Vardy going on to play a pivotal role in the most remarkable title triumph in Premier League history by scoring netting 24 times in the Foxes' dream-like 2015-16 campaign.
He eventually left Leicester in the summer of 2025, after 200 goals in 500 appearances for the club, but is now taking Serie A by storm with Cremonese, underlining that Vardy's love for the game is still as strong as ever. Indeed, if anyone is living proof that it's never too late to chase your dreams, it's Jamie Vardy.
AdvertisementGetty/GOAL9Luca Toni
At 21 years of age, Luca Toni was back playing in Serie C1. He was viewed as a lanky forward with limited technical skills. However, one thing that Toni did not lack was motivation. He had the requisite determination and goalscoring instincts to make a real name for himself in Italian football and, after getting a taste of top level football with Vicenza and Brescia, Toni's career took off when he dropped down to Serie B to join Palermo.
He scored 30 times in his first season in Sicily as the Rosanero secured a return to Serie A, where another 20 goals secured him a switch to Fiorentina. After winning the European Golden Shoe with the Viola (31 goals in 38 games), Toni then helped Italy win the 2006 World Cup.
The following year, he returned to Germany after agreeing a move to Bayern Munich and finished as the top scorer at the end of a triumphant Bundesliga campaign for the Bavarians. Toni was 33 by the time he returned to Italy on a permanent basis in 2010 but he was far from finished. He had spells at Genoa, Juventus and Fiorentina (again) – as well as a short stint at UAE Pro League side Al-Nasr – before becoming the oldest Capocannoniere in Serie A history (38) by scoring 22 goals for Verona in 2014-15. Like a fine Italian wine, Luca Toni just got better with age.
Getty/GOAL8Franck Ribery
When he was only two years old, Franck Ribery and his family were involved in a car accident that left him with serious facial injuries. Such visible scarring would have traumatised most kids but Ribery later revealed it was the making of him. "In a certain way, this accident helped me," he said. "As a child, it motivated me. God gave me this difference."
Ribery was also blessed with a talent for the game that was eventually brought to light by his fantastic fortitude. Indeed, Ribery did construction work with his father before joining Brest in 2003 and all of his hard graft eventually paid off when he joined Marseille in 2005. The winger enjoyed two fine seasons at the Velodrome and was snapped up by Bayern Munich in 2007 at 24 years old.
Ribery became a legend at the Allianz Arena, forming a lethal partnership with Arjen Robben that helped the Bavarians win one trophy after another, including a historic treble in 2013.
Of course, he was infamously robbed of the Ballon d'Or that year but the France international's entire playing career – which only came to an end in 2022, when he was 39 – is testament to Ribery's remarkable resilience.
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Getty/GOAL7Riyad Mahrez
Riyad Mahrez began his career in France's lower league, at Quimper and Le Havre, and wasn't exactly considered a potential superstar. His coaches found him to be too lightweight, too frivolous, and too selfish. Mahrez, though, continued to hone his skills and, just before he turned 23 in 2014, Championship outfit Leicester City offered him the opportunity to show them off.
After helping the Foxes get promoted to the Premier League, the left-footed winger developed into one of the most dangerous players in England. "Mahrez plays as if he is playing street football and I mean that as a compliment," Leicester boss Claudio Ranieri says during the club's astounding 2015-16 title triumph, which features 17 goals from their amazing Algerian attacker.
After eventually forcing through a move to Manchester City, Mahrez went on to lift another four Premier League trophies at the Etihad, as well as two FA Cups, three EFL Cups and, most significantly of all, the Champions League.
At 34, the Sarcelles native is still scoring goals and bamboozling full-backs in the Saudi Pro League with Al-Ahli.