Aurélien Tchouaméni: Meet the French soccer star everyone is talking about
Aurélien Tchouaméni isn’t your typical soccer star. While he stands an impressive 6’5″ – nearly three-feet taller than his best friend – his biggest asset might not be his height.
He was born in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and never went away from home. This made it easy to put him in the spotlight.
While he was growing up he was often asked to do impromptu appearances around the city for football teams or events – in other words, get noticed. While the kids around him would go wild when he arrived at school and saw him standing on the field, the adults would not stop talking about him.
“I came to this country when I was 22 years old, and I was like, ‘Whoa! What have I done?'” the French midfielder says when we meet in person and discuss his success story.
“They said that, when I arrived, my mother didn’t want me to go home. You know how people are: when you’re young everything will change, so you have to take the risk, you have to take everything with a pinch of salt.”
Aurélien Tchouaméni was born in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. (Photo: Aurélien Tchouaméni)
Tchouaméni made his first steps in the world of European football in 2001 when he moved to Paris to sign for PSG. He was a key player for his first team, but his career came to an end after three unsuccessful seasons.
Although his performances in Paris left much to be desired in terms of consistency, Aurélien’s performances while on loan at Le Mans earned more attention in France, and he was eventually loaned to Lorient.
In his time at Lorient Tchouaméni was