In 2002, I travelled to Sedan in northern France to watch a match against Lens that featured some of the Senegal players likely to represent their country in the opening match of that year’s World Cup against France.
Afterwards I wrote: “If Dakar-born Patrick Vieira were playing for the country of his birth, Senegal would have a real shout at springing the World Cup’s first upset.” I was wrong, of course: Senegal beat the then World Cup-holders, Vieira and all, 1-0 en route to the quarter-finals.
Vieira, like the great Eusébio, who died on Sunday aged 71, is part of an honourable international football tradition of African-born footballers who made their names playing for non-African countries.