The great football player, Thierry Henry

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　Written by Tomohide Warabi
It is said that football is one of the most popular sports around the world. Not only people in developed countries but also in developing countries play football. The rules of football are very simple. One is that you cannot use your hands, and two is that you kick the ball in the goal. That’s enough. Lastly you need only a ball to play soccer. That is why soccer is known well. There were some great football players in the past for example Maradona, Pele, Jico and so on. I will introduce one of the most favorite football players of mine. He is Thierry Henry and he is French. He is an amazing goal hunter in the football field and he contributes to social issue in outside football. We can learn a lot of things from him.
He belonged to four clubs in his football life - AS Monaco, Juventus, Arsenal, Barcelona. He became a famous football player and he attracted me when he was in Arsenal. The best season he belonged to Arsenal was 2003 – 04 season, because Arsenal accomplished to win the league title. Moreover, Arsenal never lost in that season. Arsenal was the strongest team in the league at that time. Thierry Henry got thirty nine goals in total in the season, and he won the European Golden Boot. In the 2005 – 06 season, he finally became a legend. On 17th October 2005 Henry became the club’s top goal scorer from the beginning of Arsenal history. He broke the record of Ian Wright who scored 185 goals. He finished the season as the league’s top scorer. As a result, he was voted as the Football writer’s Association Footballer of the Year.
His successful career is not much mentioned yet. He also succeeded in the International games. His international career started in June 1997. He got many goals in international team like Arsenl club. Do you know World Cup? World cup is the biggest championship in the world. Many people look forward to watching it and they think which country will be a top in the championship. To be the team members of the World Cup title is a great honor for football players. Do you think Thierry Henry became the member? The answer is Yes. The World Cup was held in 1998 in France. Henry and the members of French national team beat Brazil in the final. Recently the World Cup was held in German in 2006. France beat Brazil again in semifinal. The score was 1 – 0. Henry got the only one goal of the game. France lost to Italy on penalties in the final but his remarkable work remained. We can say that Henry is the person of the great humility. Henry would be the top scorer in 2006 World Cup, if he tried all penalty kicks. However, he gave all chances to the captain of France whose name is Zidane. The captain said that he would retire the career of the football player when the World Cup was over. Henry understood that the motivation of France team members would increase if Zidane got goals in the game. Henry hoped to do the team play not the egoistic play.
His personality is also shown in other ways. He contributes to social issue in outside football. He is concerned about the poverty of the world and is the member of the UNICEF – FIFA squad. He plays football for the sake of poor children, and he gets down to the discrimination to black people. He was insulted by a Spanish coach. The coach called Henry “black shit”. Of course, the coach was punished but the incident showed that racism exists at that time. Henry and Nike, which is the corporation of sports started the Stand up and Speak up campaign. It is hard to tackle tough problems such as discrimination but he decided not to run away from it. His choice should be respectful.
In this way he is not only a great football player but also respectful person. He is loved by a lot of people including me. I am sure that a person who read this article will become his fan. I hope that he continues his great work and shows us the example as a man.