Samuel Eto'o's impressive physical change that surprised everyone

Samuel Eto'o was one of the best strikers in the world for almost 15 years. He shone in some of Europe's top clubs, such as Barcelona, where he won the Champions League 2005/06 and 2008/09 alongside stars like Lionel Messi, Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez. He also excelled at Inter, Chelsea and Real Madrid, scoring 371 goals and providing 143 assists throughout his career.

However, in recent years he has been in the news for issues that have nothing to do with soccer. Weeks ago it became known that he was sued by his daughter Erika Do Rosario Nieves because of a €90,000 child support debt.

He also has problems in his country. There he is the president of the Cameroonian Football Federation and weeks ago was involved in a scandal of alleged match-fixing. CamFoot published a conversation between him and Valentine Gwain, president of the Victoria United club, in which the former Barcelona striker was heard assuring him that he would talk to the president of the referees' association to fix matches that would get the club promotion to the top flight. "Stay calm, we'll give you your three points and suspend the referee," Eto'o said among other things.

Now the former player is back in the news for a very different reason. He was present at a friendly match organized at Stamford Bridge to raise funds for the reconstruction of Ukrainian cities affected in the war with Russia. Spectators enjoyed watching stars like Andriy Shevchenko, Luca Toni, Claude Makelele, Clarence Seedorf and Gerard Piqué play. But they were surprised when they saw Samuel Eto'o.

Far from his best

Eto'o no longer looks like the spectators remembered. He is now clearly overweight and out of shape, which is only logical after he decided to retire from professional soccer.