Story Of Adriano's Career : From Footballing Emperor To Drunk

Adriano had all of the talents to be the best player in the world. However, due to a traumatic event in his life, Adriano's career sadly fell apart. So how did Adriano go from being a top talent who was set to win multiple Ballon d'Ors to someone who fell apart mentally and failed to live up to his potential? Let's take a look at the emotional story of Adriano's career. 

He was born on February 17, 1982, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Like many Brazilian footballers, Adriano was born and raised in the favelas of Brazil, which is a relatively poor environment that has a ton of crime, violence, and corruption. Simply put, Adriano grew up in poverty. 
 
New Even though Adriano was growing up in a harsh environment, he did find a way to escape from it, and that was through football. 
He often played football in the street and on dirt pitches barefoot, and that definitely helped him hone his skills. 

He got so good at football that he was even scouted by Flamingo to join the academy, and after his family pulled their money together, they could afford to send him to a school near Flamingo training. Adriano then knew that, due to his family sacrifices, he had to make it into sports so eventually he could repay his family and more in the future. 
Adriano had no doubts about making it, though, because he said in the academy he was definitely better than the other kids and that he always had a ball at his feet and was put there by God. 
 
Basically saying that God gave him the talent to be great in football. then, by the age of 16, he broke into the Flamengo senior school initially as a defender since his coach taught he was too big to play up front and would be better suited to be playing in the backline.
 

However, in his first few appearances, the flamengo coaches knew that his intimidating physical frame could be extremely beneficial up top. 
 
Hence, Adriano became a striker for the team. With the Flamengo senior squad in his debut season, Adriano scored nine goals and became one of the youngest national team debutants for Brazil. With him getting that call-up at the age of 18, and Adriano's name growing across the globe, European clubs started to take notice of the player who was deemed the next phenomenal Ronaldo. 

Therefore, it was only a matter of time before Inter Milan identified him and secured his signature. It also helped out Adriano's idol, Ronaldo, who was on the team as well, meaning that Adriano would have a great person to learn from. 
 
Ronaldo would end up being a good mentor for Adriano. Teaching him how to play and act on and off the pitch. Adriano will then impress his Inter teammates as well as the coach, because even though the game was against Real Madrid, Adriano was selected to play against Inter in his first season. Inter won a free kick, and the coach wanted Adriano to take it over the other legendary players Inter Milan had. With that free kick, Adriano banged it into the back of the net, sending the fans into a frenzy. 
 
However, in the first half of the season for Inter, Adriano didn't have that much of an impact. Obviously, Inter was a star-studded team, and he wasn't going to start over the legendary R9. Therefore, Adriano was sent on loan, where he would spend half a season in Fiorentina, getting a decent six goals and one assist in 15 games. Overall, though, it wasn't the best, and Fiorentina was a poor team at the time. That's when, during the summer transfer window, Inter were eager to sign Parma's Fabio Cannavaro, a later Ballon d'Or winner and Italy's captain who lifted the World Cup in 2006. 
 
Initially, though, Parma wasn't willing to sell him. That's when Adriano and Parma agreed on a deal that Inter will get Cannavaro, but Parma will get Adriano on a co-ownership deal where Adriano will play for Parma for two seasons.
 
So in Adriano's second and third years in Italy, he wouldn't be playing for Inter but instead for Parma. At Adriano's new club, he formed a new partnership up front with Audrey Mutu, and those two were incredible together. With them having a good understanding of each other and how they played, they're both extremely different players as well. Adriano was more of a bulldozer, while Mutu played with more elegance. 

Regardless, both Adriano and Mutu put Parma at their backs for the two seasons, with Adriano scoring 23 goals in 37 serie A games for Parma. With these two carrying Parma, clubs all over the world were taking notice. With Mutu being signed at Chelsea and Inter Milan releasing that they might have accidentally let a goal machine slip through, they decided that in January 2004 they were going to resign him. They did it for a fee of €23.4 million. 
 
For the remainder of the season, Adriano really showed that he turned from a boy to a man, featuring in every serie A and Copa Italia game where he made 21 appearances and scored 13 goals. His performance helped Inter Milan secure Champions League qualification, which the Inter Milan fans were grateful for. Due to his performance, his fans decided to give him the nickname "The Emperor"". 
 
In 2004, he was called up to represent Brazil in the Copa America. At this time, Brazil was missing a ton of players like Cafu, Kaka, Ronaldinho, Roberto Carlos, Ronaldo, etc. It was safe to say that Adriano was the biggest player in the squad at that period and was the face of the team for the tournament. 
 
In the tournament, he scored a hat trick against costa Rica in the group stages, got two goals and one assist in the quarterfinals against Mexico, and even got a goal against Uruguay in the semifinals. Brazil was set to play Argentina in the Copa America Final. 
 
Brazil's game against Argentina was pretty back and forth, with the score tied 1-1.

However, in the 87th minute, Argentina got a late lead in the match, and it seemed like they were desperate to win the Copa America against this B-team squad. Adriano then scored a late goal in the dying seconds of the match to give Brazil hope of winning the trophy through penalties, which they ended up doing. Adriano won himself the golden boot, but not only that, Brazil was crowned the best team in South America, giving Adriano one of the best days of his life. 
 
A Dark Turn of Events for Adriano 
Adriano went back to Milan, and over there he received a call only to be informed that the father had died at age 45 due to a heart attack. Zanetti, the Inter Milan captain at the time, was present when Adriano received the call and described what happened. 

 
Zanetti said, I saw him in his room; he threw his phone and started screaming. You just can't imagine that kind of scream. I get goosebumps even to this day. Ever since that day, Moratti (the current Inter Milan chairman) and I have watched over him as if he were our little brother. He kept on playing football; he scored goals and celebrated towards the sky, dedicating the goals to his father. " However, nothing was the same. He could have been the best player ever. We did not succeed in pulling him out of depression. And perhaps the biggest defeat in my career. It still hurts me that I was so powerless. 
 
Performance after the death of his father
 
After his father's death, he had his best season ever, scoring a total of 28 goals in all competitions. Even with this, Adriano was not the same, and depression took a toll on the grieving superstar. The reason for his improvement was because he felt that he needed to be unstoppable, and this was the only way he could honor his father's death.
This tough motivation was never going to last, and the depression gradually caught up to Adriano. Apart from the depression, addiction also had a part to play in his career. He started drinking alcohol excessively in order to try and cope with depression.
He was often getting more drunk and started missing training. He started developing a bad attitude, and his work ethic was thrown away. He was gradually reducing his appearances for both Brazil and Inter Milan. Even though he scored two goals in the 2006 World Cup, his club career was suffering as he scored only five goals throughout the 2006–07 campaign.

He was then loaned to the Brazilian team, Sao Paulo. Even in his country, he still wasn't able to dominate as much as he used to. He was still skipping practice and not being focused at all. Even with that, he still showed talent by scoring six goals in the 10 games he played. Sao Paulo couldn't cope with Adriano, and he was sent back to Inter Milan at the end of the season. Adriano wasn't improving, scoring 3 goals and 3 assists in 12 games, playing under Mourinho as coach. 
 
After being called up to Brazil for a World Cup qualifier match against Peru and Ecuador, he decided to stay there, and he even said in a statement that he doesn't know when he will return to Inter Milan; he wants to rethink his career. He cancelled his contract one year earlier, having no interest in playing for European football. 

He then went to his boyhood club, Flamego, who signed him on a one-year contract. He started to pick up again, scoring 19 goals and 4 assists in 30 games. He was the top scorer in this campaign.

He also helped Flamego win the title, being the reason they won their first Brazilian Serie A trophy since 1992.
 
The Emperor's Comeback to European Football 

In June 2010, Adriano signed a three-year contract with Roma. His attempt to come back to European football failed miserably. In a Copa Italia clash with Lazio, Adriano was injured and broke his right hand, and he was then granted the right the right to return to Brazil to continue his recovery. However, he stayed back in his home country longer than expected. After missing a series of flights back to Italy and failing to turn up, Roma stated that his behavior was unprofessional and unacceptable, and contract was terminated after eight games in seven months for the club, and that's how his comeback to European football failed.
 
Corinthians decided to sign Adriano and offered him a one-year deal. But he wasn't able to keep up due to the injury that kept him for six months back in Roma. His contract was then terminated a few weeks before it ended.
 
No club could keep him any longer

Flamingo gave him another chance in August 2012, but he was released in November of the same year. Altletico Paranesh, another Brazilian club, offered Adriano a deal in February 2014 but released him two months later.

Two years later, Miami United signed him, and after a few months, he left the club and retired. 
 
Adriano's life after football is still mysterious today. Some say he lost all of his money and is now poor, but he owns a couple of mansions in Brazil, even selling one in the past.
 
Some even said he joined a dangerous Brazilian gang in the favelas, but nobody confirmed that he did it or not, or that he's just hanging out in the place he came from.
 
In the Uefa Champions League final against Inter Milan and Manchester City, Adriano was invited by ESPN to help them commentate in the final for the Brazilian audience, but he missed a direct flight from Rio de Janeiro to Istanbul because he went to three different parties the night before and got absolutely wasted.