British police said on Thursday that the body retrieved from the wreckage of a crashed plane in the English Channel has been formally identified as Cardiff City's Argentina-born footballer Emiliano Sala.

The 28-year-old had been flying from his previous club Nantes in western France to Cardiff in Wales on Jan 21 to make his debut for the Premier League team when the single-engined Piper Malibu aircraft disappeared over the English Channel.