Introduction
Henry is a
French striker. His full name is
Thierry Henry. Due to a special rule in WE8, he was also allowed to play for
Guadeloupe from
World Cup IV through
World Cup VI.
Playing for France
Henry was one of the best players in WE8, though he has not seen as much playing time in the PES era. He was seen as one of the main reasons for France's dominance in the early World Cups.
Playing for Guadeloupe
Henry was allowed to play for
Guadeloupe under a WE8 provision which allowed players with dual eligibility to play on a national team on another continent. Henry was born in Guadeloupe, so he was allowed to also play for his birth-nation. Henry was obviously one of the stars of the team, which was comprised of several other French players with Guadeloupean roots. However, despite his efforts, Guadeloupe was never able to qualify to the World Cup in his three campaigns with the team. Eligibility rules changed in the PES era and players were only allowed to play for one national team. Henry opted to remain with France and has not played for Guadeloupe since.
Memorable Goals
World Cup III was the first competition to keep track of goal scorers, and Henry made history by becoming the first Golden Boot winner as he lead the tournament in scoring with 7 goals, despite coming up short in the championship game against
Cote d'Ivoire. A famous performance against
Uruguay helped him earn this distinction, as he scored 5 goals against the South Americans in their group stage match which France had to win in order to advance. He scored one goal in the round of sixteen win over
Paraguay and another, in overtime, to help France past
Serbia & Montenegro in the quarterfinals.
Henry scored a ton of goals in qualifying for
World Cup IV, for both
France and
Guadeloupe, but was not able to score any in the actual World Cup.
He regained his form in
World Cup V, scoring a brace against
Mexico and another against
Finland to help France advance past the group stage. He then scored the winning goal to beat
Argentina 2-1 in the round of sixteen and scored France's only goal in their 2-1 loss to
Mali in the quarterfinals to end the tournament with 5 goals, tied with a handful of other players and just one behind
Drogba, to take a share of the Silver Boot.
In his three qualifying campaigns with Guadeloupe, Henry scored a total of 8 goals. Seven of those were during the first campaign,
World Cup IV while he scored just 1 during
World Cup V and none in the last run for
World Cup VI. In fact, the sixth World Cup was Henry's worst of the era - he scored just 3 goals for France in qualifying and none at the actual World Cup.
In
World Cup VII he scored in overtime of the third place match against
Australia, but France still ended up losing on penalty kicks. He had also scored in the group stage win over
Wales.
France defeated
Romania 1-0 in the
Euro Cup I group stage in which Henry scored the only goal of the match. However, France failed to win any other games and did not reach the knockout round. Henry had scored 4 goals in qualifying as well.
Henry scored another 4 goals in qualifying for
World Cup IX but again only managed 1 in the tournament, during France's 2-1 loss to
Costa Rica in the group stage. He did convert a penalty kick in the round of sixteen shootout against
Netherlands, but France lost the shootout 4-3 and were eliminated.
In
Confederations Cup I, Henry scored the equalizing goal against
Brazil to draw level at 3-3 in the group stage. He then scored a brace against
Norway in the quarterfinals, but it wasn't enough as France lost the match 4-2.
Honors