Life has been unfair to ex-Arsenal star, Emmanuel Eboue, who many months ago earned millions of pounds in wages, lived in a luxurious mansion, and drove flashy cars.
But right now, the former Ivory Coast star, is presently struggling to keep a roof over his head, after he lost all his assets to his divorced wife, Aurelie, UK Mirror exclusively reports.
Eboue is about to lose the only house he is left with, to his former wife, after a lapse of a 3-week deadline given by a judge to hand over the house.
Speaking with Mirror, Eboue talked about hiding from bailiffs, talked about how he occasionally sleeps on the floor of a friend’s home, in a bid to avoid court officials who may be looking to enforce the judge’s order, how he travels by bus, and even cleans his clothes by hand because he has no washing machine.
The 34-year-old tells how his staggering riches-to-rags plight has pushed him to the brink of suicide.
In the exclusive interview with Mirror, Eboue says, “I want God to help me. Only he can help take these thoughts from my mind.”
Eboue, currently unable to play football because of ill-health, now suffers from mental illness after contending with the grief of a painful divorce and estrangement from his three kids.
Eboue also reportedly suffers from the shock of losing his grandfather, Amadou Bertin, who raised him, and his brother, N’Dri Serge, who was killed in a motorbike accident.
The former Ivory Coast defender who is presently unable to play football because of his ill-health as earlier stated, and a ban imposed on him following a problem with an agent, has expressed his desire to work with his former employers at Arsenal.
“When I talk about Arsenal helping me, I am not talking about money, it is about emotional support and opportunity to work there, to help the boys there and be happy”, he says.
“I can’t afford the money to continue to have any lawyer or barrister. I am in the house but I am scared. Because I don’t know what time the police will come.
Sometimes I shut off the lights because I don’t want people to know that I am inside.