Didier Drogba has told Romelu Lukaku to rise to the challenge after piling the pressure on himself following his controversial Sky Italia interview.
But the Chelsea legend is convinced his protégé has responded in perfect fashion with his goal in Saturday’s Club World Cup triumph.
Lukaku struck in both the semi-final and final as he picked up his first major trophy since his club record £97.5million move from Inter Milan last summer.
Scoring in front of Roman Abramovich in the 2-1 win against Palmeiras will also go a long way in making amends for his ill-judged interview in December, which saw him criticise Thomas Tuchel and disrupt Chelsea at a time when their title challenge unravelled.
Lukaku was dropped and fined – and has is still to regain the form he showed in Italian football.
But Drogba, who has acted as a mentor to the 28-year-old, insists he can turn his situation around.
“He took his responsibility to talk and put a bit more pressure on himself and delivered, scoring an important goal,” said Drogba. “Every player always has something to prove and will always want to do better, but he’s there, big game, he scored the goal to give us the lead and I’m happy with this performance.
“He put himself under a certain pressure because coming back to the club where you start was difficult. And you come back because you want to prove a point, but he’s winning and I think he’s going to make it.”
Drogba has regularly given advice to Lukaku ever since the Belgian was part of Chelsea’s academy.
He says he see similarities between the two – including their outspoken ways.
“I spoke and after that I put pressure on myself, but I spoke because I knew I could handle this pressure,” he added. “Maybe I needed that as well to perform and it’s good to see that his mentality is being positive.
“When we have the time to speak, and we do sometimes, and I give him some advice. But after that it’s his career, it’s his responsibility now.
“It’s him now. He’s in charge of the attacking players, so he has to find the ideas and make it his own story.”
Drogba was in Abu Dhabi along with fellow Chelsea legends John Terry and Petr Cech, who is the club’s technical director.
They watched on as the current generation won the one trophy never did.
Drogba added: “It’s amazing for the club to be on top of the world. What a year for Chelsea.
“That was the ambition when I joined the club in 2004 and we started by winning the League, winning the FA Cup, winning the Carling Cup and all these domestic trophies.
“Then we tried and we managed to achieve the one with the big ears (the Champions League).
“I think the objective, the goal was to win the trophies, but also to inspire the next generations. You know, players like Callum (Hudson-Odoi) and Mason (Mount) and all the guys, to inspire them and, hopefully, winning another trophy.
“That’s exactly what they did, another Champions League and then because they are competitors they remember they lost the one, the Fifa Club World Cup, in 2012. So they knew how important this was for the club. Now I’m here and I’m celebrating with them as well.”
Tuchel dedicated the win to Abramovich and Drogba joined in praise of the owner.
He added: “There’s not much to say about him because we can see all of his achievements since he joined the club, what he did for this club - he put it to another level.
“Of course, things had been done in the past and that’s why he decided to join it. But he’s written I think, the best pages of the club and I think we are very happy to have him.”
