Amanuel Kiflemariam
|
File:GS Hamasien squad 1950s.jpg GS Hamasien squad, Asmara, c. 1955–1957; Amanuel Kiflemariam standing first from left | |||
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Date of birth | January 14, 1934 | ||
| Place of birth | Asmara, Eritrea (then Italian Eritrea) | ||
| Date of death | September 1, 2014 (aged 80) | ||
| Playing position | Defender | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| – | GS Hamasien (1953–1961) | ||
| National team | |||
| – | Ethiopia (1957–1959) | ||
| * Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only | |||
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Amanuel Kiflemariam (14 January 1934 – September 2014) was an Eritrean former professional footballer who played as a defender for GS Hamasien and the Ethiopia national team. He was a member of the Ethiopian squads at the 1957 African Cup of Nations and the 1959 African Cup of Nations, the first two editions of Africa's continental championship. Among the first players from what is now Eritrea to compete at the Africa Cup of Nations, Amanuel Kiflemariam was one of only seven Eritrean players to represent Ethiopia at the inaugural 1957 Africa Cup of Nations and one of ten Eritrean players at the 1959 edition of the tournament.[1] He and his Hamasien teammate Girmaye Fikre Mariam were the only two players from GS Hamasien selected for both tournaments, a distinction that places them among the pioneering figures of Eritrean and African international football.
Born in Asmara during the Italian colonial period, Kiflemariam joined GS Hamasien — the dominant Eritrean club of the era — as a teenager in 1953. He won two Ethiopian Championship titles (1955 and 1957) and was part of the Hamasien side that completed an unbeaten league season in 1956–57, conceding only two goals in eight matches.[2] He retired from professional football in 1962 at the age of 28 but continued to coach various youth teams and later founded his own club, Aquila, which reached the A division before being cut off in 1974 due to the renewed war between Eritrea and Ethiopia.
Early life
Amanuel Kiflemariam was born on 14 January 1934 in Asmara, the capital of what was then Italian Eritrea.[2] He was the fifth of nine children — four brothers and four sisters. The Kiflemariam family produced a notable concentration of athletes: his brother Yosief played football for Stella Asmara; Yohannes was a professional cyclist; Zerufael played for Cotton Factory Club in Dire Dawa, a five-time Ethiopian Premier League champion; and Biniam served in the Navy while also competing as a professional boxer.
Club career
Football in Eritrea began during the Italian colonial period in the 1930s. Several clubs were formed and the teams played in the early Eritrean championships starting in 1936.[1] Amanuel Kiflemariam joined the then top league team, GS Hamasien in the 1953 season at the age of nineteen.[2] Hamasien, founded in 1944, was the first indigenous Eritrean club admitted to the top tier of the Eritrean league and had become the dominant force in football in the Horn of Africa.[1][3]
1955 Ethiopian Championship
Eritrea was federated with Ethiopia in 1952 and because of this, Eritrean clubs entered the Ethiopian national league system.[1] Clubs from Asmara competed with teams from Addis Ababa and other Ethiopian cities. Amanuel Kiflemariam was one of the early footballers from Eritrea who played at a high level during the period when Eritrean clubs competed in the Ethiopian league system. In 1955, Hamasien won their first Ethiopian Championship, defeating clubs from Addis Ababa to claim the national title.[4] Amanuel Kiflemariam, then twenty-one years old, was a member of the championship-winning squad.[2]
Unbeaten season: 1956–57
The 1956–57 Eritrean league season saw Hamasien achieve a perfect record: eight matches played, eight won, with 32 goals scored and only two conceded.[2] Amanuel Kiflemariam, listed as the first outfield player in the squad on page 131 of Teklit Lijam's history of Eritrean football, was a key component of this defensive record. The club went on to win the 1957 Ethiopian Championship, defeating St. George 3–1 in Addis Ababa.[2][5] GS Hamasien is therefore reported as one of the best unbeaten teams, and the best composition was the 1956–57 side of which Amanuel Kiflemariam was a member.
International career
1957 African Cup of Nations
Kiflemariam was selected for the Ethiopian national team squad for the 1957 African Cup of Nations in Khartoum, Sudan — the inaugural edition of the continental championship.[6] He is listed in the RSSSF records as "Amanuel Kidane Mariam" of Hamasien, Asmara.[7] Seven of the fifteen players in the Ethiopian squad were Eritrean — Gila-Michael Tekle Mariam (Adoulis), Girmaye Fikre Mariam and Amanuel Kiflemariam (both Hamasien), Nassir Berhe and Abraha Bayrou (Omedla), Kiflom Araya, Tesfaye Gebremedhin and Girmaye II Tessema (all Tele), Abdulkader Ahmed (Gumruk), and Senaye Hapte Gebril (Air Force) — making this one of the earliest occasions on which players from what is now Eritrea represented their country on the continental stage.[1][2] Five of the seven Eritreans, including Kiflemariam, were from GS Hamasien. Ethiopia received a bye to the final after South Africa were disqualified due to apartheid, but lost 4–0 to Egypt in the final.[8]
1959 African Cup of Nations
Two years later, Amanuel Kiflemariam was again selected for the Ethiopian squad for the 1959 African Cup of Nations in Cairo.[9] Ten of the twenty-one players in the Ethiopian squad were Eritrean — Gila-Michael Tekle Mariam (Adoulis), Girmaye Fikre Mariam and Amanuel Kiflemariam (both Hamasien), Nassir Berhe and Abraha Bayrou (Omedla), Kiflom Araya, Tesfaye Gebremedhin and Girmaye II Tessema (all Tele), Abdulkader Ahmed (Gumruk), and Senaye Hapte Gebril (Air Force) — again demonstrating the central role of Eritrean footballers in Ethiopian football of the era.[1][10] Prior to the tournament, a selection match was held at Campo Cicero in Asmara on 14 May 1959, in which an Eritrean XI defeated a team from the Ethiopian heartland 3–0. Amanuel Kiflemariam was named in the Eritrean lineup, recorded on page 162 of Teklit Lijam's book.[2] Ethiopia finished bottom of the three-team group in Cairo, losing 4–0 to the United Arab Republic and 1–0 to Sudan.[11]
Retirement and coaching
In 1961, Kiflemariam and four teammates at GS Hamasien went on strike over financial irregularities at the club. When the club's management refused to address their concerns, the five players left. A photograph dated 9 April 1961 shows Kiflemariam and two teammates on the streets of Asmara. The photo has the Italian word SCIOPERISTI (strikers, in the labour sense) written on its back.[2] Amanuel Kiflemariam did not return to professional football as a player. He was twenty-seven years old.
Had he continued playing, Amanuel Kiflemariam would likely have been selected for the 1962 African Cup of Nations squad — the tournament Ethiopia won, with a team featuring seven to nine Eritrean starters including Luciano Vassallo.[1]
Although he left the professional game, Amanuel Kiflemariam remained involved in football. He coached several youth teams in Asmara, including Barattolo,[2] and later founded his own club, Aquila, which reached the A division of the Eritrean league. The club's progress was cut short in 1974 when the escalating war between Eritrea and Ethiopia — intensified after the Derg military junta seized power — disrupted organised football across Eritrea.[1]
Honours
- GS Hamasien
- Ethiopian Championship: 1955, 1957[12]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 "History of Football Sport in Eritrea at a Glance (Part I)". Eritrea Ministry of Information. 11 August 2010.
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 Teklit Lijam, Football of Eritrea: During the Era of Successive Colonial Systems, 1936–1975, Francescana P.P., Asmara.
- ↑ "Eritrea – Foundation Dates of Clubs". RSSSF.
- ↑ "Eritrea – List of Champions". RSSSF.
- ↑ "Eritrea – List of Champions". RSSSF.
- ↑ "African Nations Cup 1957". RSSSF.
- ↑ "African Nations Cup 1957 – Squads". RSSSF.
- ↑ "African Nations Cup 1957". RSSSF.
- ↑ "African Nations Cup 1959". RSSSF.
- ↑ "African Nations Cup 1959". RSSSF.
- ↑ "African Nations Cup 1959". RSSSF.
- ↑ "Eritrea – List of Champions". RSSSF.
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