Algeria’s Abdelhamid Salhi, has played football for 22-years and coached without receiving yellow or red card.
According to BBC, the legend enjoyed his career and received an international award for playing football as a player and and coach without receiving a yellow or red card.
The 72-year-old played more than a 1,000 matches internationally for Algeria, and spent his entire career at Entente Sportive Setif (ESS), as a one-club player.
Going memory lane, Salhi began as a youth player with the club based in the city of Setif in the east of Algeria in 1963 and was with them as a player until 1977.
While comments about his secrets, he revealed that, that respect was the key to his ability to keep calm and avoid being shown a card.
Speaking to BBC Sport Africa, Salhi said, “One has to respect himself, respect the opponent and respect the referee,”
“You will never get into trouble if you put respect first, that’s the golden rule for fair play and clean football.
“I have always observed the rules religiously. I have never contested the decision made by the referee or argued with him about anything even when I am victim a bad tackle or another offence.”
Salhi also stated that, refereeing decisions during his career were often less stringent.
Speaking further with an example, also said, “In our time if a player touched the ball with his hand the referee would give a foul to the opponent team but would not show a yellow card to the offender.”
