Bobsam 'Bob' Elejiko (18 August 1981 – 13 November 2011) was a Nigerian

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

. He played as a

central defender In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

for several domestic teams between 2000 and 2011 before his death on the field during a football match.

Career

During his career, spent almost exclusively in

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

, Elejiko represented

FSV Wacker 90 Nordhausen FSV Wacker 90 Nordhausen is a German association football club from Nordhausen, Thuringia. The club's greatest success has been promotion to the Regionalliga Nordost in 1995 and 2013. It has also won the Thuringia Cup on four occasions and, th ...

, K.V. Turnhout, K.V.C. Westerlo,

Royal Antwerp FC Royal Antwerp Football Club (commonly referred to as Royal Antwerp or simply Antwerp) is a Belgian professional football club based in the city of Antwerp. They compete in the Belgian Pro League, the top flight of Belgian football. Founded in 1 ...

S.C. Beira-Mar Sport Clube Beira-Mar (), commonly known as Beira-Mar, is a Portuguese sports club based in Aveiro, Portugal. Its football team currently plays in the Campeonato de Portugal, the fourth national level, having gained promotion by winning the Ave ...

K.M.S.K. Deinze Koninklijke Maatschappij Sportkring Deinze, KMSK Deinze or simply Deinze, was a Belgian football club founded in 1926 based in Deinze, East Flanders. The club colours were orange and black and the team last played in the Challenger Pro League ...

, K.V. Red Star Waasland and K. Merksem S.C.. In 2008, he had trials with

FC Carl Zeiss Jena FC Carl Zeiss Jena () is a German football club based in Jena, Thuringia. Founded in 1903, it was initially associated with the optics manufacturer Carl Zeiss. From the 1960s to the 1980s it was one of the top-ranked clubs in East Germany, won ...

Crewe Alexandra Crewe Alexandra Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Crewe, Cheshire, England. Its first team competes in League Two, the fourth level of the English football league system. Nicknamed 'The Railwaymen' ...

, Gillingham and

RBC Roosendaal RBC, previously known as RBC Roosendaal, is a football club based in Roosendaal, Netherlands. RBC currently plays in the fifth-tier Vierde Divisie after bankruptcy in 2011, restarting the club in the tenth tier Vijfde Klasse. History 1912– ...

, but did not gain a contract with any club.

Death

Elejiko collapsed while playing a fifth-tier match with his team K. Merksem S.C. against F.C. Kaart, a team from

Merksem Merksem (; former spelling: ''Merxem'') is a district of the municipality and city of Antwerp in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It has 44,808 inhabitants as of 2021. History The history of Merksem goes back to Gallo-Roman times. During that perio ...

Antwerp Antwerp (; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and a Municipalities of Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of Antwerp Province, and the third-largest city in Belgium by area at , after ...

, on 13 November 2011. Despite resuscitation attempts pitch side, Elejiko was pronounced dead and the match was abandoned. The cause was later determined to be a traumatic rupture of the

aorta The aorta ( ; : aortas or aortae) is the main and largest artery in the human body, originating from the Ventricle (heart), left ventricle of the heart, branching upwards immediately after, and extending down to the abdomen, where it splits at ...

References

External links

Voetbal International profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Elejiko, Bobsam 1981 births 2011 deaths Nigerian men's footballers Men's association football defenders Belgian Pro League players Challenger Pro League players KFC Turnhout players K.V.C. Westerlo players Royal Antwerp F.C. players S.C. Beira-Mar players S.K. Beveren players Nigerian expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Belgium Expatriate men's footballers in Portugal Nigerian expatriate sportspeople in Belgium Association football players who died while playing K.M.S.K. Deinze players Sport deaths in Belgium 21st-century Nigerian sportsmen