Nicky Salapu

Nicky Salapu (born September 13, 1980 in Pago Pago) is an American Samoan association football goalkeeper who currently plays for Mitra Kukar in Indonesia. He is the holder of the record of conceding the most number of goals in a single match. He previously played for PanSa East, whom he left in December 2008.^[1] He also played for SC Mauerbach in the lower divisions of Austrian league.

He played in the OFC FIFA World Cup Qualifications for World Cup 2002 and World Cup 2006. American Samoa lost all of these eight matches, and conceded 91 goals. He was the first goalkeeper, under whom, the American Samoa National Football Team registered their first ever official FIFA World Cup qualifiers win.

Club career

The career of Nicky Salapu is not well documented. It is known that he played for PanSa East for eight years, beginning in 2000 and terminating in 2008. He also played in Austria for SC Mauerbach, a side in the Niederösterreichischer Fußballverband (Lower Austrian Football League). He signed for a fee around 850 us dollars. transfer from PanSa East in 2008. In 2011, he came back to PanSa East, from where he went to play for Mitra Kukar, a club playing in the Indonesia Super League (ISL), which is a fully professional football competition as the top tier of the football league pyramid in Indonesia. He has played there until July 2013 and from this point his current club is unknown.

International career

He conceded 31 goals to Australia in a World Cup qualifying match on April 11, 2001 and this score Australia 31–0 American Samoa still counts as the official world record. These 31 goals came from 7 different players; Con Boutsianis (3 goals) (minutes 10, 50, 84), Archie Thompson (13 goals) (minutes 12, 23, 27, 29, 32, 37, 42, 45, 56, 60, 65, 85, 88), David Zdrilić (8 goals) (minutes 13, 21, 25, 33, 58, 66, 78, 89), Aurelio Vidmar (2 goals) (minutes 14, 80), Tony Popovic (2 goals) (minutes 17, 19), Simon Colosimo (2 goals) (minutes 51, 81) and Fausto De Amicis (1 goal) (minute 55).

In 2007, he missed his flight from Hawaii to the South Pacific Games in Samoa. Because he could not make it on time he was replaced by the 17-year-old Jordan Penitusi. He was not eligible to play until he arrived for the last match of American Samoa in the South Pacific Games with Tonga, but there he was an unused substitute. In November 2011, he was the goalkeeper when American Samoa won its first ever full FIFA match, a 2-1 win over Tonga during the first round of the OFC qualifiers for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. In 2015, he was called up as Sub goalkeeper for the 2018 World Cup Qualifiers. American Samoa won their last two matches, but failed to qualify to the second round.^[2]

National team statistics

^[3]

References

External links

• Nicky Salapu – FIFA competition record