Salif KEÏTA Traoré (Patreon)

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Keita was born in Bamako, playing in his country for AS Real Bamako and Stade Malien. With the former, which he represented in two different spells, he was always crowned Première Division champion.

In 1967, 20-year-old Keita left for France to join AS Saint-Étienne, where he won three consecutive Ligue 1 titles, including the double in 1968 and 1970. In his last two seasons with Les Verts combined, he scored an astonishing 71 league goals – 42 alone in the 1970–71 campaign – but the team failed to win any silverware; in 1970, he was voted African Footballer of the Year.

Keita joined fellow league side Olympique de Marseille in the 1972 summer. After the club tried to force him to assume French nationality he opposed, leaving in the ensuing off-season for Valencia CF in Spain.

Spanish newspapers were accused of racism when one headline read El Valencia va a por alemanes y vuelve con un negro ("Valencia goes out to buy Germans and comes back with a black man"), but he was always loved during his spell at the club, netting in his debut with the Che, a 2–1 La Liga home win against Real Oviedo,[2] and being eventually nicknamed La perla negra de Malí (The black pearl of Mali); he complained, however, that he was constantly played out of position.[3]

In 1976, after three years with Valencia, Keita signed for Sporting Clube de Portugal, where he replaced another legendary goalscorer, Héctor Yazalde. In two of his three seasons with the Lisbon side he scored in double digits, winning one domestic cup. He retired at the age of 34, after a couple of years with the New England Tea Men in the United States.

Honours

Club[

• Malian Cup: 1963–64, 1965–66, 1966–67

• Ligue 1: 1967–68, 1968–69, 1969–70

• Coupe de France: 1967–68, 1969–70

• Taça de Portugal: 1977–78

International

Mali

• Africa Cup of Nations: Runner-up 1972

Individual

• African Footballer of the Year: 1970

Decorations

• FIFA Order of Merit: 1996