Secretly, everyone of us has dreamt about it. One moment, you're kicking a ball around with some friends, having a laugh and the next moment you're being dragged away by a scout from a professional team, who is offering you a contract to fulfill your ultimate boyhood dream: playing professional football.
These sort of things generally happen in children's books or movies, where a previously unknown boy is picked up on the street and whisked away to play his sport professionally, at which point he quickly becomes a superstar.
Sometimes, one of these fairy-tales becomes reality as Guinean Oumar Cissé experienced. During the summer, the 19 year old worked at a French camping, entertaining the guests and organizing sporting events for the children.
One day he encountered a Belgian man, with whom he had an animated conversation about football. During this conversation, Cissé mentions having played professionally at Clermont-Ferrand and Lokeren and having been a Guinean youth international, albeit briefly.
The Belgian turned out to be Yannick Asselman, the son of Patrick Asselman, who in turn is the manager of Belgian side FCV Dender. The club needed a defender and Asselman had become intrigued by Cissé's past, so when he returned from his holidays, he took Cissé with him to have a trial in Belgium.
The Guinean impressed during his trial and a friendly match and was offered a contract by the Belgian side. Being pulled off the camping you work for to play professional football, truly a story of from rags to riches.
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