Forty years since Garrincha’s last dribble

This Friday marks the 40th anniversary of Garrincha’s death, the tragic legend of Brazilian soccer. Considered the best dribbler in history, Mané Garrincha won two World Cups (1958 and 1962) with the ‘canarinha’, where he never lost playing with Pelé. This January 20, four decades ago, Brazil lost the angel with crooked legs, a victim of alcoholism. The footballer whose epitaph reads: “Here rests in peace the man who was the joy of the people: Mané Garrincha”.

Manuel Francisco Dos Santos, who was nicknamed Garrincha by his brother when he was young (name of a bird that lives in Mato Grosso), died early on Thursday, January 20, 1983 in Rio de Janeiro at the age of 49. According to the doctor who performed the autopsy, “pulmonary congestion, pancreatitis and pericarditis, all in the clinical picture of chronic alcoholism.”

Brazil mourns an idol that, although considered ‘The Joy of the People’, He died alone, almost forgotten, a victim of alcoholism, of all his excesses, of his own mistakes, of the treatment of some managers, of life. The final farewell to Garrincha took place at the Maracaná. In the streets, millions of Brazil fans, broken by pain, wanted, broken by pain, to pay tribute to him.

The angel with the crooked foot

Looking back at his beginnings, it seems unlikely that Garrincha, who suffered from polio, could become a soccer star: his feet are turned 80º inward, his right leg is 6 centimeters longer than his left, and his spine is bent. That’s where another one of his nicknames comes from: the angel with crooked legs. From the age of 10 he was addicted to tobacco. His problems with alcohol ended his life. In fact, Garrincha himself uttered this phrase: “I don’t live, I live life.”

Despite so much against him, Garrincha has become a soccer legend. A legend who, like many, grew up in a difficult place. In his case, in Pau Grande (Rio), and he quit school early to start working whatever he could and eventually in a textile factory. But, at the same time, thanks to his crooked feet and the little balls he’s been playing with since childhood, Garrincha developed a dribble that was undetectable for his rivals. A dribble that fascinates the world.

But tragedy often haunts Garrincha. So, as a player of Botafogo (the team of his life, where he played between 1953 and 1965 and where he won three Cariocas Championships), Joao de Carvalahaes, therapist for the Brazilian team, was diagnosed , after making a test, that Garrincha is “mentally weak and not suitable to work in a collective game.” However, Nilton Santos and Didí, his teammates at BotafogoThey interceded for the winger with Vicente Feola, the Brazil coach who decided to include Garrincha in his list for the 1958 World Cup. Joao de Carvalahaes also advised against Pelé’s participation for psychological reasons!

The best three minutes in football history

The rest is football history: Garrincha was one of the stars of the Brazil team that won its first World Cup. He started it on the bench, but in the third game, against the USSR, Feola put on Pelé and Garrincha for the first time. In just three minutes, Garrincha beat two Soviet players and smashed the ball over the crossbar. Then Pelé was inches short of scoring. Until Vavá beat the legendary goalkeeper Lev Yashin. Journalist Gabriel Hanot assured: “The best three minutes in the history of football.”

Pelé and Garrincha never moved from Brazil’s eleven in the 1958 World Cup in Sweden, the first World Cup achieved by today’s five-time champion (1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002, he holds the record).

The best player of the World Cup in Chile 1962

But Garrincha’s World Cup was the one in 1962, where Pelé was injured in the second game and the Botafogo winger took on the responsibility of leading Brazil to the two-time championship. And he was the best player of that 1962 World Cup and top scorer, with 4 goals, tied with his teammate Vavá and Florian Albert (Hungary), Leonel Sánchez (Chile), Valentín Ivanov (Soviet Union) and Drazan Jerkovic (Yugoslavia).

Throughout their careers, Pelé and Garrincha have always been compared. “Pele is the goal of man; I always set up the plays. He is the king of football, I am happy in the background,” said Garrincha. Meanwhile, Pelé, who died on December 29, said of Garrincha in 2018: “I have never played with anyone or against anyone better than Garrincha. In the field we are partners. Off the pitch, we’re brothers.”

Together, with the Brazilian team, Pelé and Garrincha won the World Cups in 1958 and 1962. In ‘canarinha’ they scored 55 goals between them, Pelé 44 and Garincha 11. ‘O Rei’ always said, without Garrincha, he couldn’t have done it.

That’s how Garrincha plays

His Botafogo teammates had to ask Garrincha in training to stop dribbling. He is the king of dribbling and with his football he spreads joy in the stands. He overcame his physical problems based on a natural talent for this sport. Considered the best dribbler in the history of football, he stands out for his speed, his overflow and his extraordinary ability to get away from rivals. In a span of land.

Garrincho is a magician as a player, but off the pitch His life was chaotic, he had a problem with alcohol and tobacco from a young age. He was married three times, had 14 known children (one of them after an affair during the 1958 World Cup in Sweden) and one of his wives was the singer Elza Soares. In April 1969, Garrincha was driving drunk with Elza, one of his daughters and the singer’s mother. There was an accident and his mother-in-law died instantly. He was sentenced to two years in prison which was suspended.

After Chile 1962 Garrincha started having leg problems, but the leaders of Botafogo forced him not to stop and play secretly. One leg began to atrophy. Economic problems came. The down. bankruptcy The definitive withdrawal, in 1972. Oblivion