Google Celebrates Football Legend Stephen Keshi With A Doodle On His Posthumous Birthday

Nigerian football legend and former Super Eagles captain and manager who famously led the team to AFCON victory in 2013, Stephen Okechukwu Keshi is being celebrated by Google today with their Doodle feature.

Keshi who passed away almost two years ago would have been 56 today and is being celebrated by Google as one of Africa’s foremost football legends even in death.

Nicknamed ‘Big Boss’, Keshi had 64 international caps as a player. His international debut was a friendly match against Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) on July 18, 1981. His last international game as a player was a 2-0 defeat of Greece in the 1994 FIFA World Cup.

After his success as a player, Keshi took up a coaching role. When he became coach of the Togo national team, he brought his trademark passion with him.
Against all odds, Keshi helped Togo qualify for the 2006 World Cup in Germany.

In 2011, he became the Nigerian national team coach, cementing his place in African and world football history. As coach of the Nigerian team, Keshi won the African Cup of Nations in 2013, and in 2014, he became the first coach of an African nation to make it to the knockout round of a World Cup.

He is also the only Nigerian to have won the African Cup of Nations as both Player and coach; captaining the 1994 squad to victory before leading the 2013 squad to AFCON glory as manager.