Claude Papi (16 April 1949 – 28 January 1983) was a French

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

midfielder who is regarded as the all-time best player for the SC Bastia.

Playing career

Born in Porto-Vecchio,

Corsica Corsica ( , Upper , Southern ; it, Corsica; ; french: Corse ; lij, Còrsega; sc, Còssiga) is an island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the 18 regions of France. It is the fourth-largest island in the Mediterranean and lies southeast of ...

, Papi played his entire career for SC Bastia. He led Bastia to the

1978 UEFA Cup Final The 1978 UEFA Cup Final was a football match played on 26 April 1978 and 9 May 1978 between PSV Eindhoven of Netherlands and SEC Bastia of France. PSV won the tie 3–0 on aggregate, with a 3–0 victory at home following a goalless draw in Ba ...

, scoring seven goals that season. Papi remains the all-time leading scorer for Bastia with 134 goals in 479 games.

International career

Papi was a member of the France national team in the

1978 FIFA World Cup The 1978 FIFA World Cup was the 11th edition of the FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial international football world championship tournament among the men's senior national teams. It was held in Argentina between 1 and 25 June. The Cup was won by t ...

. His only World Cup appearance came in a 3–1 group match win against Hungary.

Death

Papi died on 28 January 1983 at the age of 33 of a ruptured aneurysm.

Honours

Bastia *

Ligue 2 Ligue 2 (, League 2), also known as Ligue 2 BKT due to sponsor (commercial), sponsorship by Balkrishna Industries, is a French professional football league. The league serves as the second division of French football and is one of two divisions ...

: 1967–68 * Coupe de France: 1980–81 * Challenge des champions: 1972 * UEFA Cup runner-up:

1978 Events January * January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213. * January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of Republican People's Party, CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd go ...

References

Papi's Career Stats & Accolades

External links