Donnerstag, 7. Februar 2019

Senegal 3



Papa Waigo (CFC Genoa | Italy)
vs. South Africa (1:1) | African Cup of Nations 2008 in Ghana
A rather simple shirt with an amazing history, this is. Nearly a year ago, I had the brilliant idea to try getting in touch with all German coaches who have coached foreign national teams. Most of them were involved in the famous football coaching development program run by the German FA and Olympic Committee to educate coaches abroad. One of them was Peter Schnittger, who never became a huge coaching star, but definitely is an inspiring and absolutely outstanding character in world football. He coached Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Thailand Madagascar, Benin and Senegal between 1968 (!) and 2000, while running coaching courses across the respective country in the same time. After weeks of research, I was able to get hold of his postal address and send him a letter, congratulating him on his work and asking if he, by chance, has any shirts left from those days that he doesn't need anymore or, if he wants to keep them, if I can visit him to just take a brief look.

He did come back to me within days and absolutely loved my collection and was super happy to receive my thankful note. Sadly, he also mentioned that most of the shirts he had, including many from the 70s, were given to friends or "false friends" who knocked them off for profit, over all those years. He was nearly apologetic for this, which of course he doesn't have to be. I was just glad to hear of him. He later send me the only shirt he has left from Senegal, and a huge collection of newspaper articles, pictures and more of his time in Africa. Absolutely amazing stuff, really!
Just as a side note and to give you an idea of his affection for Africa: he and his wife still spend half the year in Senegal, which got his second home nation by now!
Thanks, Peter, I love the shirt a lot!

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