JUSTINUS SONI “JUSTIN” FASHANU, who was born on this date (d:  1998) was an English footballer who played for a variety of clubs between 1978 and 1997. He was known by his early clubs to be gay, and came out publicly later in his career, becoming the first professional soccer player/footballer to be openly gay. He was also the first black soccer player to command a £1 million transfer fee, with his transfer from Norwich City to Nottingham Forest in 1981, and had varying levels of success as a player afterwards, until he retired in 1997.

After moving to the United States, in 1998 he was questioned by police when a seventeen-year-old boy accused him of sexual assault. He was charged, and a warrant for his arrest was issued in Howard County, Maryland, on April 3, 1998, but he had already left his home. According to his suicide note, fearing he would not get a fair trial because of his sexuality, he fled to England, where he killed himself in London in May 1998. His suicide note stated that the sex was consensual. In 2020, Fashanu was inducted into the National Football Museum Hall of Fame.

Fashanu was listed at number 99 in the Top 500 Lesbian and Gay Heroes in The Pink Paper. In March 2009, a football team, The Justin Fashanu All-stars, was named at a special event in Brighton, supported by the FA. The team, named in his honor, was created by the Justin Campaign, which is a campaign against homophobia in football and promotes the inclusion of openly gay players in football.

In 2017, Netflix released the film, Forbidden Games: The Justin Fashanu Story.