When Didier Drogba reluctantly moved from Marseille to Chelsea in 2004, the striker left behind a shirt that the southern French city's Catholic basilica hung in one of its chapels, next to plaques that honor soldiers killed in World War II.
Perhaps more importantly for Chelsea, Drogba left a piece of his heart in Marseille, too.
This Sunday, Drogba could cap a fabulous season by finishing ahead of Manchester United's Wayne Rooney as the top scorer in the Premier League. Going into the final day of matches, they have 26 league goals each.
This has been the best of Drogba's six years at Chelsea. And about time, too.
Because as good, at times great, as Drogba has been for Chelsea, the nagging suspicion that he could have been better, perhaps much better, just won't go away. If only his heart had truly been in it.
Fact is, Drogba has spent much of his time in London pining to be elsewhere. Instead of being thrilled at the prospect of playing for one of soccer's wealthiest sides, Drogba felt betrayed when Marseille cashed in and sold him to Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich.
In London, Drogba wanted out. He courted AC Milan. In 2007, when Chelsea got rid of Jose Mourinho, the manager who had recruited him from Marseille, Drogba wept and thought hard about leaving, too.
Even now, when Drogba says he feels settled at Chelsea, that he is happy, one cannot help but notice that he doesn't exude the same depth of passion that he does, for example, when reminiscing about his year basking in the Provence sun and the adulation of l'Olympique de Marseille's fans.
"In Marseille, I played with my heart. It was a single year, but I wasn't counting, I wasn't calculating, I wasn't thinking," Drogba told France Football magazine this week.
"I miss Marseille. It's true. I have a lot of friends there among the directors, but also physiotherapists at the club and even the local baker!"
In a few years time, will Drogba be saying "I miss Chelsea?" That seems far less likely.
In 2004, the princely sum of 24 million pounds (about $35 million) that Chelsea paid for Drogba seemed like a good deal, though it was a record for a British striker. Those who had seen him play for Marseille, who marveled at the way he bullied and overpowered defenders, admired his strength on the ball and the 11 European goals that propelled his team to the UEFA Cup final, felt confident that France's player of the year would stamp his mark on the Premier League.
He did - in fits and starts, and not always for the right reasons. Even in a sport rife with cynical fouls and other scheming to hoodwink referees, Drogba has been singled out for feigning injuries, play acting and diving for penalties. Those are the infuriating sides of a muscular goal-scorer whom most managers would simply love to have on their team.
Yet in the league, Frank Lampard is a better scorer. Even though he plays from midfield, Lampard has put away 83 goals to Drogba's 81 in their six league campaigns together. Lampard also creates more goals.
In short, there are players, like Lampard, who just get on with it, season after season, and others, like Drogba, who sometimes fail to give their best. This week, Chelsea fans for the first time elected Drogba as their player of the year, itself an indication of how long it has taken him to truly put down roots at the club. Lampard has won that honor three times in the six years that Drogba has been at Chelsea.
Drogba has scored many crucial goals for Chelsea - like the right-footed lob in extra time that beat United and won the FA Cup in 2007. But at other crucial times he has let Chelsea down. His red card in the Champions League final lost to United in 2008, in particular, stands out.
His impressive performances this year - he has scored 33 times in all competitions, equaling his previous season's best at Chelsea - is also tempered by his rough patches of mediocrity in the previous two seasons. Only once, in 2007, has Drogba finished as the Premier League's top scorer.
It would be wrong to suggest that Drogba isn't a committed professional, that he hasn't toiled, played through pain and earned his handsome wages at Chelsea. But nor has he always lived up to expectations or displayed the same devotion that helped make him a revered figure in Marseille.
"He left a mark, an imprint," says Stephane Odier, general secretary of the Our Lady of the Guard basilica that overlooks the French port city and its Velodrome stadium. "There was a growing aura about him."
Drogba is the only soccer player whose shirt has been hung in the church, "It was a way to thank him," says Odier. The hallowed memento was taken down in 2006 for renovation work in the basilica and is now kept in a cellar, but it is still treasured by the church's rector, himself an avid supporter of l'Olympique de Marseille, which this week won its ninth league title.
"We spoke about that shirt only recently," Odier said in a phone interview. "He (the rector) said it was out of the question that the shirt goes anywhere else."
John Leicester is an international sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at jleicester(at)ap.org.
