John Obi Mikel Biography
John Obi Mikel (born April 22, 1987) is a Nigerian footballer. He is a central midfielder who currently plays for Chelsea.He was born John Michael Nchekube Obi, the son of a former civil servant. Mikel was playing top-flight football for Plateau United aged 15 and, by 2003, was gaining headlines for his country at the FIFA Under-17 World Championships held in Finland. After a brief spell in South Africa with Ajax Cape Town, Mikel gained global recognition in 2005 by starring at the FIFA World Youth Championship where Nigeria were beaten 2-1 in the final by Argentina.[1]
During the 2003 FIFA Under-17 World Championships, commentators continually misspelled his middle name of "Michael" as "Mikel". He decided to keep the new name, saying that it had a special ring to it.
Mikel made his debut for Nigeria's senior team on August 17, 2005, when he came on as a second-half substitute in a 1-0 friendly win over Libya. He did not play for the national team again prior to being named in the squad for the 2006 African Cup of Nations. In Nigeria's first group game, which was against Ghana, Mikel was an unused substitute. However, he was introduced into the second game, against Zimbabwe, early in the second half. Within ten minutes of coming on, he had supplied both the corner that resulted in Christian Obodo heading the game's opening goal, and scored Nigeria's second goal. He made his first international start in Nigeria's final group game, a 2-1 victory over Senegal. As of February 7, 2006, Mikel has earned four international caps and scored one international goal. During the cup, Mikel said that he had been instructed not to make any public comments about his club career.[12]. FIFA is to investigate claims that Mikel had received death threats.
On June 2nd 2006, Chelsea, Manchester United, Lyn Oslo and John Obi Mikel reached a settlement to resolve the future of the player. Mikel's registration will be transferred from Lyn to Chelsea; Manchester United have also agreed to terminate their option agreement with Mikel. Under the terms of this agreement Chelsea will pay Manchester United £12million, half paid upon the finalisation of the contract and the other half in June 2007, and Lyn £4million, half payable immediately, and half payable in June 2007. As a result of this settlement, all claims in this matter - which Chelsea were never an official party to - were withdrawn. [14] On July 19th 2006 Chelsea were granted a work permit for the midfielder after they completed the £16million signing in June 2006. ] On July 31, 2006 he stated that he prefers to be called Mikel John Obi instead of John Obi Mikel, as he had most commonly been called.