Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is an FC Barcelona player. The French born Gabon international is an interesting character for a number of reasons; we take a look at some of them:
1) He was born on 18 June 1989 in Laval, a town in France with 50,000 inhabitants and also the home town of another former Arsenal La Liga player, Francis Coquelin of Villarreal.
2) Aubameyang has three nationalities; French by birth, Gabonese from his father and Spanish from his mother. Nevertheless, he decided to play international football for Gabon.
3) The new Barça striker is the only player in the squad to have played for clubs in Europe’s top five league. Aubameyang started his career at AC Milan but never appeared for the Italian side instead he went on loan to Lille, Monaco and Saint Etienne before signing for Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund and then Arsenal.
4) Son of a Spanish mother, Aubameyang has confessed on more than one occasion his desire to play in La Liga. His mother Margarita was born in the Spanish two of El Barraco near Madrid before moving to France at an early age.
5) The footballer admitted on his social media platforms that his excellent Spanish is down to his grandmother, also Spanish, who died in 2018.
6) Pierre-Emerick is not the only footballer in the family. His father Pierre had a long career mainly in France and represented Gabon at international level on 80 occasions. His two brothers are also professional footballers.
7) Aubameyang is a big fan of Marvel comics and Batman in particular. Years ago the striker had a bat style haircut and his car had Batman stickers – he has also celebrated goals during his career by donning superhero masks.
8) The striker’s celebrations have been a source of great interest over the years. In his time at Borussia Dortmund he dressed as Batman with Marko Reus as Robin as well as Spiderman. Acrobatic celebrations are also a speciality.
9) Over the last decade, Aubameyang has always reached double figures in terms of goals. His best season came in 2016/17 when he was top scorer in the Bundesliga with 31 goals, finishing third in the Golden Shoe rankings behind winner Leo Messi (37 goals).
10) Aubameyang has had a long list of notable coaches during his career. At Dortmund he played under Jürgen Klopp and Thomas Tuchel whilst at Arsenal he was coached by Arsène Wener, Unai Emery and former Barça player Mikel Arteta.
Source: fcbarcelona.com
