Cote d’Ivoire Player Profile : Kolo Toure

Kolo Toure was born on March 19, 1981 in Sokoura Bouake, Côte d’Ivoire. He is around 6ft tall and weights 76kg. He joined Arsenal Football Club in February 2002 from Asec Simosa for around £150,000.

He impressed on the club’s tour of Austria in the summer of 2002, which led to his Gunners debut in the FA Community Shield victory over Liverpool at the Millennium Stadium.

He quickly established himself at the club and has been a regular for both club and country. He is regarded as a utility player because he can play right back, centre back or midfield. In fact, I think he would fit in as a striker as well.

Toure continued to be a member of the first team squad throughout the first month of the season, putting in a number of impressive performances from the bench.

He saved his best performance for the London derby at Chelsea, Toure would score the equaliser in a 1-1 draw for the ten man Gunners and picked up the Man of the Match award.

During the 2003/04 season, Kolo took his game to another level. He was forced to play in the centre of defence at the start of the season - and within weeks had made the position alongside Sol Campbell his own.

Toure was immense, barely putting a foot wrong as Arsenal lifted the title without losing a single Premiership game.

For his country, Kolo has been a regular for the Elephants since 2000 and was vital in ensuring the Elephants World Cup qualification bringing to the team a lot of experience. His experience is definitely vital to the Elephants when they start out in World Cup Finals in June.

Kolo comes from a family of six brothers and two sisters. And infact he has two footballing brothers, Yaya and Ibrahim. He is a devout muslim and believes his faith has helped him a lot in his footballing career.