The San Pedro Stadium, as well as the official ball of the African Cup of Nations, will bear his name. A few days before the start of the CAN in Ivory Coast, his aura has not weakened. Laurent Pokou died in November 2016, but the memory of the former Ivory Coast Elephants striker remains. A posthumous recognition for the man who was the man of Asmara, in reference to his performances during the African Cup of Nations in Ethiopia in 1968 and also remained famous for his quintuple against the Ethiopians, two years later during the CAN in Sudan…
Long prevented from leaving Ivory Coast, the man whom King Pelé himself had designated as his successor ended up, late in life, exporting his talent. And against all odds, while many clubs were looking at him, it was in Brittany, in Rennes, that he landed. The start of a 5-year sporting and human adventure… On Breton land which still remembers the Ivorian striker today.
“The Rennes years of Laurent Pokou”, a major report by Antoine Grognet.