Papiss Cisse was terrible in training and I was worried about him, but even Didier Drogba was stunned by Newcastle's wonderful goal.
Newcastle cult hero Papiss Cisse was terrible in training but was able to turn up on a Saturday and surprise the best.
That is the verdict of Alan Pardewwho was in charge of Newcastle from 2010 to 2014 and led them to fifth place in the Premier League in 2011/12.
One of the main reasons for their good campaign was their business in the January transfer window, signing the relatively unknown Cisse from Bundesliga Freiburg.
What followed was surprising: 13 goals in 12 games for the Senegalese striker (including a surprising double against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in May.
The first goal has gone down in Premier League history: an outrageous attempt from outside the goal at an impossible angle to leave Petr Cech fluttering.
That helped Newcastle win 2-0 in west London, the last time they won at Stamford Bridge in the Premier League.
But while Cisse wrote himself into Geordie folklore, Pardew has since admitted the striker failed to train to save his life.
Speaking on talkSPORT, the first western hamCharlton and crystal Palace boss said live on air:
“That was my strongest team in Newcastle, the year we finished fifth.
“Papiss Cisse was a unique character. Obviously he scored goals that night, but in training he was terrible at times!
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“We thought, 'Oh my God, he's going to score someday!' And then she would do something incredible like an overhead kick or lift it over the centre-half's head and smash it into the corner.
“He just had a unique ability and was a lovely guy.”
Chelsea's 2011/12 team was nothing to sneeze at either, as it was a season that would go down in history as they won the Champions League and FA Cup with a legendary striker. Didier Drogba in front of the team.
But even the Ivorian was shocked by what he saw in May 2012, when Pardew added: “(Drogba) was on the touchline when the play was our way and obviously Papiss crashed it, off his boot and it went right into the Upper corner.
“And Didier was about 20 meters away from me and he looked at me out of the corner of his eye as if to say, 'Did that just happen?'
“I looked at it too and said, 'I can't believe it either!'”
While Cisse came to life in the Premier League in his first six months, he was unable to regain that form again at St James' Park, scoring just eight goals all season the following campaign and two the following season.
In total, the striker scored 44 goals in 131 appearances for the Magpies before moving to China to sign for Shandong Luneng in 2016.
