At the grand re-opening of Niketown London this week, Footy-Boots.com pinned down Chelsea & Cote d’Ivoire striker Didier Drogba to get his take on football boots.
Drogba has been an enigma to many football boots fans around the globe. As well as being one of the games most high-profile stars, ‘The Drog’ is much talked about by football boot fans, with many a question being asked about his match day customised version of the Nike Superfly II.
So when Kyle got one on one with the Ivorian Powerhouse, he went straight for the jugular and asked what the story is with his custom Superfly II, Drogba said;
“The normal one that Nike does, I tried to play in it and there’s not as much grip as I need. So, I asked Nike if they could make me a boot with the studs from the Mercurials from around 2002-2003, so I could play even when the pitch was wet.”
So contrary to the suggestion that Drogba plys his trade in the Mercurial SL soleplate, Drogba requested from Nike that his soleplate be modelled on the original Mercurial Vapor from back in 2002.
We drilled down further and confirmed that the sole is still made of Carbon Fibre, as you’d expect for a top end football boot, so essentially, it’s only the shape of the studs that have changed.
Kyle pushed Drogba further on the subject;
“The studs are a bit longer, so I can get a little bit more grip” – which is interesting, given the Superfly II‘s focus on adaptive Traction.
Would Didier ever switch to another type of boot?
“I think the Mercurials are the perfect boot for me. But if I had to change, maybe I’d go for the CTR360; I think they’re a similar boot to what I’m wearing now – but I’ve been wearing the Mercurial for years and years, I won’t change!”
Did the powerful frontman have any advice for Footy Boots readers who love their football boots;
“You have to love your football boots! You have to clean them every day after training, because they’re the ones that might make you famous – you never know!”
And what ‘The Drog’ says, we do. We’ve polished our boots ready for the weekend, have you? – Have a read of Caring for your football boots
although he may not be my favourite player, i admire drogba’s honesty about the soleplate situation.
although, doesnt this mean that the sense stud and all that is just a high priced gimmick from nike?
i also like his choice of the CTR360’s as his second choice if all mercurial boots just spontaneously exploded lol, ive seen the the ctr360 II’s and they actually look like they were built for speed!
I used to wear Vapors but the SG studs are way too long, back in 2002 the soleplate was perfect, Nike needs to bring that design back, we constantly see pro players opting for a mixed soleplate rather than the SG option and it doesn’t surprise me that Drogba has asked for an alternative………..surely this tells Nike something????
straight from the horses mouth… only goes to show the new fangled superfly ii sense studs are crap…
They listen to Ronaldo and not the Drog?
Maybe that’s where Nike’s been failing.
Wow he’s so frank and honest. That’s good. It definitely is a plus for him to not be so cliche and diplomatically sensitive.
Well Nike, time to change the studs of the mercurials from now onwards.
The amount of proffesional players that actually use the nike sense studs is limited in my opinion. CR7 used a hybrid type thing, Drogba uses MVII tech. Yet for some reason Nike continues to pound the same topic. I do agree that the MVII studs were really good in comparison.
Nike should use this feedback from players asking for custom shoes and build the “perfect” pair of boots.
I like drogbas choicE of studs. I mean the first mercurials were around 6-7 ounces. Now they have nikes lightest boot weighing in at around 7.5 ounces I mean cmon