Revisiting Alberto Spencer, the gem buried deep within South America’s football history

• Alberto Spencer scored 54 goals in 87 Copa Libertadores games

• Spencer finished top-scorer twice in the single tournament

• The forward represented Ecuador and Uruguay jointly

Akshat Mehrish At the peak of his playing career, Alberto Spencer had two national teams, let alone domestic clubs, battling for his commitment. Yet, the forward, whose lineage can be traced all the way back to England, never skewed to one side or the other; he collected the rare honour of representing two international teams simultaneously, scoring goals in the colours of his native Ecuador and his adoptive Uruguay during a prosperous 13-year-long career. Between 1959 and 1972, the years that correspond with Spencer’s international debut and retirement, respectively, the Ecuadorian represented his home nation 11 times and scored four goals. As a subset of that international spell, Alberto Spencer infrequently donned the Uruguayan kit between 1964 and 1967, including in a friendly fixture against England at Wembley, a game in which he, ironically, became the first Ecuadorian-born individual to find the net in that stadium.

Yet, Spencer’s legacy is one that is most notable at the domestic level. One of the best forwards of his time, the Ecuadorian was coveted across the Atlantic during his peak but remained on the American side, much to the chagrin of South American defenders of the day. Spencer dazzled audiences in the local Ecuadorian and Uruguayan leagues, but it was in the continental cup where he left an indelible mark. Such had been his contribution to the sport in South America that his omission from Pele’s list of 100 Greatest Living Footballers in 2004 caused quite a stir on the mainland and drew criticism from several stakeholders of the sport. Two years after the neglect from one of the greatest ever to play football, Alberto Spencer died away in Cleveland, Ohio, and his name was buried deep within the shifting sands of South American history. Spencer was born in Ancon, Santa Elena, on the West coast of Ecuador, to a Jamaican family of English origin in 1937, at a time when football was booming on the continent. Two FIFA World Cups had already been played, the first in Uruguay, but the country of Spencer’s birth had declined to participate in either. This evasion would cost Ecuador dearly, who failed to play in the competition during the forward’s time with the national team, and until much, much later. They qualified for the tournament finals for the first time in 2002, fifty years after Spencer had hung up his boots.

Growing up as a bright prospect in Santa Elena, Spencer joined Guayaquil-based Everest as a prospect in 1953 before graduating to the first team two years later. He spent four prolific years with Everest, scoring at a rate of more than a goal per game — 101 in 90 — and earned a transfer to Uruguayan behemoths Penarol in the process, on the eve of the inaugural Copa Libertadores edition. Spencer’s time with Penarol was laden with trophies. The striker won eight league titles and three continental cups, including the first two ever to be contested under the Libertadores banner. He was the star of the first edition of the tournament, scoring four in the preliminaries against Bolivia’s Jorge Wilstermann, two in the semi-finals against Argentina’s San Lorenzo, and then another in the first leg of the finals against Paraguay’s Olimpia. Penarol won the title after drawing the return leg, with Alberto Spencer finishing as the tournament’s first golden boot winner. The year after, Spencer and Penarol again won the Libertadores, albeit with the forward’s production dropping to less than half his previous tally. He scored thrice in the 1961 edition, yet one of those three goals came in the finals win against Palmeiras, helping the Uruguayan giants retain the title. In 1962, Santos of Brazil prevented Penarol from making it three-in-a-row, but a minor positive for them was Spencer’s return to form, as he scored six goals and finished joint-top-scorer.

Penarol reclaimed the continental crown in 1966, the same year Spencer’s country of origin, England, won the FIFA World Cup for the first and only time in history. The Ecuadorian, meanwhile, helped his team to the third championship in South America by, most notably, scoring twice in the deciding third leg of the finals against Argentinian giants River Plate. Alberto Spencer continued to torment defences in South America for six more years, five of which he spent with Penarol and one with Ecuador’s Barcelona SC. A regular sight in the Libertadores for more than a decade, Spencer concluded his domestic career with 87 appearances in the club championships and 54 goals, a tally that makes him its highest scorer in history to this day.