That news of Eden Hazard‘s retirement at the age of just 32 has sparked tributes from some of the greats in the game – both past and present – comes as no surprise.
His playing days came to a close not with a bang, but with a whimper at Real Madrid, where he never managed to find his footing, but even long spells on the sidelines and subdued scattered appearances for Los Blancos are unlikely to overwrite a glittering career.
The former Belgium captain’s legacy at Lille and Chelsea will take some beating.
Capable of performances that could be alternatively virtuostic or smash-and-grab gritty, Hazard has long been established as a legend at both of his other old clubs and he retires as a player among the most decorated of his generation.
Here, Mail Sport runs the rule over the top 10 moments of his career.
Eden Hazard retires at 32 leaving a glittering legacy in both Ligue 1 and the Premier League
The player’s seven years of success at Chelsea made him one of the most decorated players of the 2010s
The Belgian’s titanic dribbling efforts and pinpointed accuracy saw him score 110 in blue
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Claiming the double (part one)
Hazard was just 17 when he was promoted to Lille’s first team on a permanent basis under Rudi Garcia and it didn’t take long for his star to rise.
Increasingly a regular fixture in the starting XI, Hazard won the Ligue 1 Young Player of the Year at the end of the season – before winning it again the following season, after only narrowly missing out on Player of the Season itself.
Hazard got his hands on the honour eventually, after playing a crucial role in Lille’s domestic double in 2011, becoming the youngest player to win the award in its history.
The Ligue 1 side fought tooth and nail to hang onto their academy talent for as long as they possibly could – but after five years, eventually relented.
As a teen Hazard immediately distinguished himself in a side that went on to do the double
Leaving it late in Europe (Chelsea 1-1 Sparta Prague 2012-13)
As would become habit during his Chelsea career, Hazard had an innate understanding of when to step up.
After moving to Chelsea after their 2012 Champions League win, it didn’t take long for Hazard to start showing, consistently, exactly why Roman Abramovich’s Premier League behemoth had tempted him away from Ligue 1.
In his first season, Hazard notched up 62 appearances as an immediately undroppable starlet under both Roberto Di Matteo and Rafael Benitez, scoring 13 and assisting a heroic 24 more.
But one standout came when Hazard kept Chelsea on course in the Europa League – which they would go on to win with victory against Benfica in Amsterdam later that year. Dropped down from the Champions League, Chelsea were a hair’s breadth from being booted out of the competition by Sparta Prague. But Hazard had only left it late.
1-0 down at Stamford Bridge, Hazard picked up a pass midway into the visitors’ half, before sneaking through a baggy line of four hapless opponents. Just inside the box, he wasted no time pummelling the ball with his left boot to stretch the netting at the furthest corner, dragging back Chelsea into the tie – and putting them back in the hunt for silverware.
Chelsea were losing on aggregate to Sparta Prague after they scored the vital away goal
But Hazard left it late to score in the second minute of added time and save Chelsea’s bacon
Claiming the double (part two)
Hazard grew in stature during his second season at the club, becoming a defining player under Jose Mourinho and a fan favourite – aided by the recent departure of club legend Frank Lampard.
Whilst Hazard couldn’t match hellraiser Diego Costa, he only missed his tally by a whisker, scoring 19 in all competitions to Costa’s 21, with both players spurring Chelsea on to claim their first Premier League title since Carlo Ancelotti’s departure.
The player was richly rewarded: Hazard scooped up the FWA Footballer of the Year award, the PFA Player’s Player of the Year award, and the PFA Young Player of the Year award.
Crushing Spurs’ title hopes (Chelsea 2-2 Tottenham 2015-16)
In the face of a dismal end to their own season, Chelsea planned on at least taking comfort in blowing up that of their loathed rival Tottenham when they invited them to Stamford Bridge in May 2016.
The almost-comically dirty match – which ran the gamut from shirt-pulling to eye-gouging, complete with a brawl on the final whistle – saw the Blues shatter Spurs’ hopes of winning a maiden Premier League title with a ground-out, pull-no-punches draw.
But amidst the 11 bookings doled out by Mark Clattenburg – likely a conservative day’s work – Hazard’s role in the fight stands out.
Always up to fan the flames in a derby, Hazard scored the equaliser-slash-match winner with a jaw-dropper, a curving stroke from the very edge of his right foot that might have missed the top corner by a milimetre – until it didn’t.
The Belgian celebrated in front of the desolate away fans, snuffing out their hopes of the title
A dizzying spell for Coquelin (Chelsea 3-1 Arsenal 2016-17)
After a lacklustre 2015-16 which saw them finish 10th, Chelsea came back with a bang in 2016-17 and would later go on to claim the Premier League title at the end of the season in an about-face that most Blues fans would give their arm for in 2023.
Hazard was a lynchpin of Antonio Conte’s side, outshone only by his team-mate – and PFA Player of the Year – N’Golo Kante, but of his 16 goals in the league that season, one remains permanently etched on the brain of Chelsea supporters whenever the Gunners make the trip west.
Francis Coquelin was the man tasked with keeping Hazard under wraps in midfield, but he was no less than bamboozled by his opponent as he tried to shut down a budding run over the halfway line.
Trying to keep up with his dribbling, the ball sticking to Hazard’s boot as if glued, Coquelin is turned around by his force, and spun like a top before landing on the Stamford Bridge turf.
The Arsenal midfielder got back on his feet as Hazard made for the box, but he can only jog shiftily and watch as Hazard pulls the pin on his reputation with neatly chipped goal that leaps over his former team-mate Petr Cech, too low to make the save.
Hazard’s speed and force – with no doubt a pinch of disbelief – literally floored Francis Coquelin
Silverware from the spot (FA Cup final: Chelsea 1-0 Manchester United 2018)
Penalties can be few and far between in FA Cup finals – prior to 2018, the last scored in normal time came from Ruud van Nistelrooy in Manchester United’s win over Millwall in 2004.
But Hazard stepped up to the spot intent on giving United a taste of their own medicine in 2018, in Chelsea’s cagey 1-0 victory over the Red Devils.
The comedown after winning the Premier League the following season had curdled the atmosphere at Stamford Bridge, but the campaign ended on the brightest of notes for soon-to-be outgoing manager Antonio Conte, when Hazard sent David de Gea the wrong way and scored the ties only goal.
Hazard had drawn the penalty too, rushing so determinedly at goal that Phil Jones was forced to hurl whatever he had at the player. Ultimately, however, it wasn’t enough.
Desperation saw Phil Jones skittle the player heading for David de Gea’s goal at Wembley
The player was cool from the spot and Chelsea clung on to see out their only trophy of the term
Breaking two records with one kick (Chelsea 2-1 Watford 2018-19)
Although fans didn’t know it yet, at the end of the 2018-19 season, Hazard would eventually call time on his spell at Stamford Bridge after seven trophy-laden years.
Whilst it wasn’t necessarily a season to remember for Chelsea – although the club’s third European trophy in less than 10 years was nothing to be sniffed at – Hazard’s individual performances were unwaveringly strong.
The season also saw him break two enormous records – on the same day, with one strike. Watford were the hapless victims this time, travelling to west London on Boxing Day to lose 2-1, with both goals courtesy of the Belgian.
But before he scored the deciding penalty, Hazard netted his 100th Chelsea goal, adding his name to an exclusive centurion club – which was also his 150th club career goal.
Red faces at Anfield (Liverpool 1-2 Chelsea 2018-19)
Anfield is no easy place to play away, but Chelsea have a better record swiping a win from Liverpool at the ground than most of their Premier League adversaries.
Since the start of the competition, the Blues have beaten the Reds in their own backyard seven times, but few players have featured in the tie as dramatically as Hazard did during the 2018-19 season.
Called upon to get Chelsea’s Carabao Cup aspirations off on the right foot, Hazard broke the 1-1 deadlock and ended Liverpool’s perfect start to the season in all competitions with a spell of majesty that saw him scythe through the defences of Jurgen Klopp’s side.
Sparking the play himself, Hazard nutmegged Roberto Firmino to feed Azpilicueta, before sprinting to collect the ball back from his captain to the right of the box. Not content with just embarrassing the Brazilian, Hazard slipped past Naby Keita before nutmegging Alberto Moreno – only to scoop up the loose ball himself and leather it past Simon Mignolet.
Whilst it wasn’t in Hazard’s top five goals at the time, the former player may reflect differently on his goal against Liverpool at the end of his career
‘I don’t know if it’s in my top five goals,’ Hazard pondered after the final whistle. ‘But it’s up there, because it’s against Liverpool’.
No help needed at West Ham (Chelsea 2-0 West Ham 2018-19)
Hazard went on to score 21 goals in 52 appearances across all competitions in what would be his final season, but few were as mesmeric as his effort in the club’s 2-0 victory against West Ham.
After collecting a neat pass from Ruben Loftus-Cheek just inside West Ham’s half, Hazard tees himself up in the centre of the pitch and starts running. And keeps going. And going – tripping past claret and blue shirts who can’t seem to close in on him, before slipping through a pack of players on the edge of the box.
Keeping his balance until the last, he lays off to outfox a deflated-looking Lukasz Fabianski just as a defender chops him down – but he’s too late.
The midfielder had a strong individual season in his last campaign at Stamford Bridge
Farewell in Baku (Europa League final: Chelsea 4-1 Arsenal 2019)
What a swansong it was. Speculation had been swirling for some time that 2018-19 was set to be Hazard’s final season in west London, spurred along by a dazzling individual season. The Belgium made no secret of his dream destination – Real Madrid – and there was little evidence to suggest he wouldn’t be the perfect fit.
Chelsea had struggled that season under Maurizio Sarri, the fans and the ownership unable to connect with Sarri-ball and the tentative possession-based play it had come to symbolise. After a Carabao Cup final to forget, hopes of silverware rested on Europa League victory against Arsenal.
Never mind that Arsenal had a man synonymous with winning in the competition at Sevilla, Unai Emery, in charge: in Baku, Chelsea served up their crosstown rivals a demolition for the ages as the Gunners fell to pieces.
Hazard scored twice in the rout, and created a third in a performance seemingly designed to ease his moving on – whilst making it all the more bittersweet that the Blues wouldn’t be able to call upon him the following season.
Winning the Europa League after a turbulent season ensured that Hazard left the club on a high
