In the first of a series of articles looking at some of the lesser known footballing families across the globe, Andy Edgeworth looks at the family who put African football on the map.
On a balmy evening in Milan, in the 67th minute of an unforgettable World Cup encounter, a gangly 24-year-old who played his football in the French second tier, innocuously headed goal-ward from a hashed clearance.
The header was tame but somehow squirmed under the hapless goalkeeper, Nery Pumpido. What that player did not know at the time was that he had sown the seeds of one of the World Cup’s greatest stories. That man was François Omam-Biyik.
He was, of course, the man who scored the goal as nine-man Cameroon beat reigning World Champions Argentina in Milan’s San Siro Stadium in the opening game of Italia ’90.
Having already seen his older brother, André Kana-Biyik, sent off for two bookable offences earlier in the match François wrote himself into legend with that header.
While it would be his seemingly ageless compatriot Roger Milla that would go on to take the plaudits, it was Biyik who started the party and announced his footballing family to the world.
Born to a large family in Sackbayeme – a large suburb of the Cameroonian capital, Yaoundé – François came from good footballing stock. His father Emilio played professionally in Cameroon and his family would continue the trend.
His older brother André also played in France with Le Harve and Metz and their younger cousin, Francis Eliezer Omam, played in Russia until he retired in 2009.
André’s son, Jean-Armel Kana-Biyik, currently plays in Turkey with Kayserispor having made over 150 appearances in Ligue 1 in France with Le Harve, Rennes and Toulouse.
But while the Biyik’s have certainly had a positive impact on Cameroonian football it is François who retains the most fame where his name is now literally a term in his homeland for ‘headed goal’ following his winner against Maradona & Co in Italy.
His header in that match ranks only behind the memory of Claudio Caniggia’s boot flying skyward after he was ruthlessly wiped out by Benjamin Massing having already dodged a plethora of horrific lunges, eventually chopping the long-haired forward down and receiving his marching orders.
Not many families have had such an influence on the football of a nation (some may say a continent) but the Biyik’s were the forerunners for some stellar names from the African nation like Eto’o, Foe, Song and Geremi. They were true pioneers of Cameroonian football.
