Feature: Andre Ayew wants to follow Abedi Pele into Champions League history

Published on: 20 February 2011

Almost as soon as he could count, Andre Ayew lost track of the times he had watched the goal that won Marseilles the European Cup (now the Uefa Champions League).

"It's something I grew up with -- the corner coming in; the header," he says, recalling a cross being met at AC Milan's near post by Basile Boli.

"But it's not just me. It's a goal France will never forget, the first and only Champions League for a French club."

If France recalls with clarity the Boli header, Ayew lingers on the identity of the crosser. His father took that corner. Left-footed, high and looping, with a late curl just before Boli leaps and flexes his neck: 1-0 to Marseilles, the underdog conqueror of Milan in Munich, 18 seasons ago.

To compare the television close-ups of Abedi Pele Ayew then to his son now is striking, and not just because of shared facial features. There's the fine left foot, too, and the Marseilles shirt.

Andre Ayew, known as Dede, is at the club where his father reached his highest peaks in football, and on Wednesday he will play his first game in the knockout phase of the Champions League against Manchester United.

Dede Ayew is 21. He talks with unusual maturity for one so young. That may be the benefit of a privileged education -- he attended baccalaureate schools in the countries where his father played -- but as he speaks, what becomes clear is that he grew up with rare pressures.

Sports audiences can be unforgiving judges of heirs. Just ask Jordi Cruyff, Chris Cowdrey or Liam Botham.

"What was difficult," Dede remembers, "was people always talking about my dad and what he had done, always wanting to see him in me."

His attitude? "I'd been taught to expect that. When I decided to try to make a life in football, I knew what would be waiting . . . and I knew I wanted to make my own name in it."

For that, Dede had expert advice. Abedi Ayew also had a name to live up to: he had assumed the sobriquet Pele as a teenage prodigy in northern Ghana.

In the West African tradition of adhesive nicknames, Pele became Abedi Ayew's professional title.

He was Abedi Pele when he won the African Cup of Nations at 17; he was known much more often as Pele than as Abedi Ayew through his Marseilles career and through Serie A and the Bundesliga, where he played in the late-1990s, and when he was elected three times as Africa's Footballer of the Year.

"People asked, 'Who is this new Pele?' " Abedi would reflect. Now 46, he has three sons who have become successful footballers: Dede, Rahim and Jordan. Dede was always likely to draw most attention, as the second-born of a famous love story.

The courtship of Abedi and the future Mrs Maha Ayew became a Ghanaian Romeo and Juliet -- the groom a provincial would-be footballer, the bride from a wealthy background in the capital, Accra.

Maha's father disapproved of Abedi's family background and of his job: few African footballers made fortunes in the 1980s; fewer made it big in Europe.

Gaining Maha's hand, Abedi jokes, was "the toughest game of my life. You can say it went to extra time and a penalty shootout".

For the children, the partnership would be stimulating.

"I always had two ways of seeing things," says Dede.

"My father was from a really poor background. My mother came from a 'good' family. We followed our dad where he played, so learnt about different places and cultures. I wouldn't say I had everything I wanted, but we had the most important things and parents who helped us grow up."

Father and son talk often -- "about football, but also about life", says Dede, though he has chosen his journey with a sense of autonomy.

Born in France, he was 18 months old when his father reached his first European Cup final in 1991, three when Abedi won the trophy.

Dede enrolled in the Marseilles youth academy at 16, after what he recalls as an excellent learning period on the hard pitches of west Africa.

He was eligible to play for two countries. France wanted him.

"I thought hard, but growing up in Ghana, and with my dad playing for the Black Stars (as Ghana are known), I always wanted to wear that jersey."

Wise choice: in late 2009, Dede led Ghana to the Under-20 World Cup.

Last July in South Africa, when Ghana came within a shootout of a World Cup semi-final, he was second only to Germany's Thomas Muller as the tournament's best young player.

A week or so later, Dede returned to Marseilles, uncertain of his future. Head coach Didier Deschamps had lent him to second division Arles-Avignon in 2009-10, an apparent snub.

Abedi Pele turned all pushy parent and rang Deschamps, a former teammate, and asked why. Deschamps said he wanted to see Dede develop. Dede promptly galvanised Arles-Avignon to an unlikely promotion.

By last June, he was being courted by at least four Premier League clubs, including Arsenal. But Deschamps now wanted Dede back. Wise choice: a broad consensus has Dede as Marseilles' best outfield player this season.

And not because he is a chip off the old block. Abedi was a No 10, while Dede prefers central midfield, though he is often posted on the left wing or cutting in, tackling back, wide on the right.

His idol? You know the answer. His specific role model? Not his dad, who was a flamboyant, attacking footballer, but the former Real Madrid and Argentina midfielder Fernando Redondo.

I barely need to ask if Dede remembers the moment Redondo turned a Champions League tie in 2000 against Manchester United in Madrid's favour. "Very clearly: Redondo changes foot, goes past Henning Berg, crosses for a goal. Amazing."

Last month, Alex Ferguson watched Marseilles draw with Monaco. He saw Dede Ayew, industrious, composed on the ball, surprisingly mature.

Ferguson was also surprised to see in the line-up the man with whom Dede shares his Provence home -- Jordan Ayew, 19, Dede's little brother. Some predict Jordan may turn out the best of all the Pele progeny.

Source: Sunday Times

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