For a country of around 33 million people, Mozambique has an outsized football heritage. Its greatest export was once called the finest player Africa has ever produced, and the modern Mambas now field men in the Premier League and the Champions League. That is part of why Mozambican fans study the Premier Bet football betting odds so closely each weekend: there is almost always a compatriot worth watching somewhere in Europe.
Here are the five best, with the caveat that the two finest of them were sent to Portugal by the colonial era and never wore Mozambique’s shirt. Born in Lourenço Marques, today’s Maputo, in 1942, Eusébio was scouted at Sporting de Lourenço Marques and joined Benfica in 1960. What followed was one of the great careers in the sport: 473 goals in 440 official matches for Benfica, 11 Portuguese league titles and the 1962 European Cup.
He won the Ballon d’Or in 1965 and finished as top scorer at the 1966 World Cup with nine goals as Portugal took third place, ending his international career with 41 goals in 64 caps. Two European Golden Boots, in 1968 and 1973, underline the consistency. Also Maputo-born, in 1935, Coluna was nicknamed “O Monstro Sagrado”, the Sacred Monster, for the authority he brought to Benfica’s midfield.
Across 16 seasons he made 525 official appearances and scored 127 goals, and he scored in both of Benfica’s European Cup final wins, against Barcelona in 1961 and Real Madrid in 1962. He played in five European finals in all. For Portugal he won 57 caps, scored eight goals and captained the side to third place in 1966. He later returned home to coach Mozambique and serve as its sports minister.
Manuel José Luís Bucuane is Mozambique’s record goalscorer, with 30 goals in 94 appearances across