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Guy Acolatse

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Guy Acolatse
Personal information
Full name Guy Kokou Acolatse
Date of birth (1942-04-28) 28 April 1942 (age 82)
Place of birth Togo
Position(s) Attacking midfielder
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1963–1966 FC St. Pauli
1966–1969 HSV Barmbek-Uhlenhorst
1970–1973 FC St. Pauli II
International career
Togo
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Guy Kokou Acolatse (born 28 April 1942) is a Togolese former professional footballer who played as an attacking midfielder. He was the first Black professional footballer to play in Germany.[1][2]

Career

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Acolatse made his debut for the Togo national team at the age of 17.[1] He joined one of the two major clubs in Lomé, the Togolese capital, from Kpalimé.[1] He was courted by French and Belgian clubs but rejected their offers.[1]

German coach Otto Westphal, who had coached the Togo national team and who had become FC St. Pauli coach, convinced Acolatse to join the club in August 1963.[1] The club played in the Regionalliga Nord, which was the German second tier at the time.[2] He made his debut in a 4–1 league win against Altona 93.[2] Acolatse spent three years at the clubs, making 43 appearances and scoring six goals.[2] He then played a further three years for HSV Barmbek-Uhlenhorst, another Hamburg-based side.[1] He returned to FC St. Pauli in 1970 to play for the club's second team, where he played for three years, occasionally helping out the first team.[1]

Personal life

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Acolatse moved to Saint-Denis, Paris in 1980 where he coached the third team of Paris Saint-Germain and worked at Ford.[2] As of April 2020, he was retired and still lived in the Paris suburb where he trained children in an honorary capacity.[2]

In 2021, he featured in Schwarze Adler [de], a documentary detailing the experiences of Black players in German professional football.[3]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g Bauer, Gabi; Piro, Peter (18 June 2010). "ak 551: Die hatten noch nie einen Schwarzen gesehen". analyse & kritik (in German). No. 551. Retrieved 19 June 2021.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Melzer, Dennis (28 April 2020). "Guy Acolatse: Die Geschichte von Deutschlands erstem schwarzen Profifußballer". Spox (in German). Retrieved 19 June 2021.
  3. ^ Bülau, Maximilian (19 April 2021). "Von Mbom bis Kostedde: Das sind die Protagonisten der Amazon-Dokumentation "Schwarze Adler"". HNA (in German). Retrieved 18 June 2021.