T

Following his summer move to Real Madrid, the

pressure on Eden Hazard is greater than ever

HITTING

NEW

HEIGHTS

WORDS: Nick Bidwell

of the trade with the Lille youth team

and add a little more muscle. Not Puel.

He blooded Hazard at the first

opportunity, sending him on as a late

substitute in a Ligue 1 encounter at

Nancy in November 2007.

“I’d picked him a few weeks earlier in a

friendly versus Club Brugge,” recalls Puel.

“I didn’t know how he would react. In the

end he did some extraordinary things

and performed very ably. He already

had that rare ability to go past four or

five players in quick succession – and,

what’s more, in pressure situations.

“He would put his foot on the ball

and time seemed to stop – as if he’d

suspended it in order to make the

best pass. When you thought he might

be going up a dead end, he’d find a way

out. He had this quickness of thought

and lucidity.”

Lille’s youngest-ever debutant,

Hazard was anything but a

standard-issue rookie. Here

was a kid loaded with

great expectations. He

knew it and so did

an army of

hroughout Claude Puel’s coaching

career, caution has normally been the

star by which he navigates. But there’s

an exception to every rule – and Puel

was certainly bold when handing Eden

Hazard his debut for northern French

outfit Lille at the tender age of 16

years, 10 months and 17 days.

Many other bosses might

have waited for the young

Belgian to develop

further, to pick up

a few more tricks

PLAYER Eden Hazard

BIOGRAPHY