-In a fitting respect, English side Manchester City retired Marc-Vivien Foe’s number 23 shirt permanently as a mark of respect
By Boris Esono Nwenfor
Marc-Vivien Foe died tragically in the summer of 2003 whilst on international duty for Cameroon, collapsing on the pitch during a game with Colombia in the semi-final of the Confederations Cup in Lyon. With no one around him, he fell to the ground and was unable to be resuscitated despite 45 minutes of attempts by medics to get his heart started again after being taken from the field, according to the BBC.
20 years on, the memories of the 28-year-old’s death are still fresh in the memories of Cameroonians, who wondered what he would have become had the tragedy not behalf. A first autopsy failed to establish the cause of the 28-year-old’s death, but a second found he had been suffering from a condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.
“Marc was a great man and someone we all loved. He was our brother and we must continue playing for our brother. We must come to terms with this tragedy, but it will take so long,” Cameroon legend Roger Milla said back then.
After consultation with Foe’s widow, Marie-Louise, as well as his parents, FIFA decided that the Confederations Cup final between France and Cameroon should go ahead as planned. Many of France’s players, including striker Thierry Henry, were in tears as they lined up before the game.
Foe was buried on the site of the football academy he had been having built in his hometown of Yaounde. He used to send a proportion of his wages home to his father Martin each month to fund the construction of the complex, but N-gwa Niba says it now “sadly has practically been abandoned now because of lack of funding”.
A promising career cut short
Born on May 1, 1975, in Yaounde, Cameroon, Foe’s passion for football was evident from an early age and his career spanned over a decade. He began playing for Canon Yaounde before going on to play in France with Lens before migrating to England to play for West Ham and Manchester City.
“He was just 28 and you wouldn’t meet a nicer bloke in football. Marc was a great player for West Ham and a terrific footballer. We grew close during his time at West Ham and often after we went our separate ways, he would phone me and joke ‘Harry, I want to play in your team,’ Harry Redknapp.
“He was a fierce competitor on the pitch but he was harmless. He was a gentle giant. He will not have had an enemy anywhere except on the pitch, because he was such a strong competitor. He was a great young man. He wore a permanent smile and you couldn’t help but like him. This is a sad day for football.”
“Marco was a very private person though he wasn’t averse to saying something when it needed to be said. He was one of the most genuine likeable blokes you could ever meet and I know I speak for all the lads when I say that. You could say he was a gentle giant, an incredibly strong bloke, a great athlete with a great caring side, too,” Nicky Weaver said.
Foe’s Legacy – improvement in medical testing
A positive result of Foe’s death has been huge improvements in both the testing of footballers for heart problems and the treatment they receive during matches. Foé’s legacy has seen heart screening become a regular part of football across the world, and his contribution to the game.
“That’s what I remember first and foremost: what he stood for as a man. He was a very quiet, very humble family man, and as you say, it’s poignant that we’re here today, and rightly so.” Stewart Pearce.
Professor Sharma admits he was shocked when he watched footage of the on-field treatment that Foe received. “A player went down without any contact, his eyes rolled back, he had no tone in his body, so it was clear something terrible had gone wrong,” he said.
“It took quite a while for the penny to drop that this was not going to get better with the magic sponge or fluid being poured on his head though. As cardiologists, we like resuscitation to start within a minute and a half of someone going down, and for the defibrillator to be used within three minutes.”
“That gives us an outcome of about 70% living. Yet a good five, six minutes went by before I could see any positive action with Marc-Vivien Foe. That was perhaps because this was the first time something like this had happened in football. After all, you don’t expect a champion footballer like this to go down and die.”
Then Fifa’s chief medical officer, Jiri Dvorak, admits big improvements had to be made following Foe’s death. “We have done a lot of work to reduce the risk of sudden cardiac arrest since then,” he told BBC Sport. “At all levels, we have an examination of players before arrival at a competition.
“We have also trained the sideline medical teams in CPR and using defibrillators. We have a plan if something happens and the equipment – including for the team physicians of all teams. The medical personnel are adequately educated.”
