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Today would have been Marc-Vivien Foe's 49th birthday.

It barely seems credible that it is almost 21 years since his death from a heart condition when he was playing for Cameroon at the Confederations Cup in 2003.

Foe was West Ham's record signing when he joined the club in 1999, on the same day as Paolo di Canio.

The midfielder played 48 games for the Hammers before moving to Lyon and then on loan to Manchester City in the summer of 2002.

He score nine goals in 38 games for City that season and would probably have made a permanent switch to Manchester had he not tragically died in June 2003.

His death at the age of 28 shocked the world, although sadly it took another few years before the issue of potentially fatal heart problems among supposedly super-fit professional athletes started to be properly investigated fully.