John Paintsil rates Didier Drogba ahead of Mohamed Salah as Africa’s greatest in Premier League history

Former Ghana international John Paintsil has rated Chelsea legend Didier Drogba as Africa’s greatest in Premier League history despite Mohamed Salah overtaking the latter as all-time top scorer.

Salah’s hat-trick against Manchester United moved him up to 107 goals in the Premier League, three more ahead of Drogba, who scored 104 during his time in the Premier League with Chelsea.

“When you talk about Premier League history, it’s a big thing. You just mentioned Drogba leading in goals and now Salah has taken over,” Paintsil told Goal .

“Drogba took about eight years to set his record and Salah has taken about four years, so we can say currently Salah is the African hitting it so hard, but also we have to look at the efforts on how they did it.

“I’d say there’s a difference between the two players. Drogba was a powerhouse. Although he spent about eight years and Salah has spent about half of that, I will still give the accolade to Drogba.

“But Salah is not that far from overtaking Drogba looking at the way he’s going. In terms, of quality, power, and team ethic, I can say most of Salah’s goals are individual goals.”

He added, “As I am talking to you know, I am a technical man, I’m a coach, so I will speak from a coach’s point of view. Players who play as a team and work according to the pattern of the team are always brilliant.”

“Individual players we don’t add as team players. But sometimes when you need individual brilliance, then one can go in for them.

“Drogba was very good in the air, he was very good on free-kicks, he was also good on long-range efforts and his leadership quality was also good on the pitch and off the pitch.

“He had all these and he was a people’s person, socialised more, and as a sportsman all these count. But by the way, Salah is going, he might catch up very soon.”