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Football Legend Mario Zagallo |
FIFA President Gianni Infantino has expressed condolences to Brazil over the death of Mario Zagallo, who won four soccer World Cups for Brazil as either a player or coach.
Infantino described Zagallo’s impact on the World Cup as
“unparalleled”.
Zagallo died on Friday at the age of 92.
A tough and talented left winger, Zagallo played on the team
that won Brazil’s first World Cup in 1958 and he kept his place in the side
that retained the title four years later.
In 1970, he coached a Brazil squad that featured all-time
greats like Pele, Jairzinho, Rivellino and Tostao – one that many consider to
be the greatest national team ever to play the game.
They won Brazil’s third World Cup in Mexico.
That made Zagallo the first person in the sport to win a
World Cup as both a player and a manager.
Later, he was assistant coach to Carlos Alberto Parreira
when Brazil won their fourth title in 1994 in U.S.
The Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) said it would
hold a seven-day mourning period to honour Zagallo, while the South American
Football Confederation (CONMEBOL) said it was mourning the loss of the only
four-time world champion.
Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva expressed
condolences to Zagallo’s family, friends and “millions of admirers” and
declared three days of mourning in Brazil.
His Brazilian fans loved him for his idiosyncratic
personality and unapologetic nationalism.
He liked to say he was born with victory at his side and was
rarely shy to challenge those who said his teams were too defensive.
One of his most famous outbursts came after Brazil won the
Copa America in Bolivia in 1997.
His team were unfancied but when the final whistle went, an
emotional Zagallo, his face red thanks to the rarified air of La Paz, screamed
into the television cameras:
“You’re going to have to put up with me!”
The phrase is still frequently repeated by Brazilians in all
walks of life celebrating vindication.
Zagallo was also known for being highly superstitious and
believed the number 13 brought him luck.
He liked to coin phrases that contained 13 letters, he got
married on the 13th of the month, and once even joked he would retire from the
game at 13:00 on July 13, 2013.
Nicknamed the Old Wolf, Mario Jorge Lobo Zagallo was born on
Aug. 9, 1931, in Maceio on Brazil’s impoverished northeastern coast.
His family moved to Rio de Janeiro before his first birthday
and it was there he fell in love with football.
His first dream was to be an airline pilot but he was forced
to abandon that due to poor eyesight.
Instead, he studied accountancy and played soccer in his
spare time with local side America, then one of the biggest clubs in the city.
“My father didn’t want me to be a football player, he
wouldn’t let me,” Zagallo said in an interview published by the CBF.
“Back then it wasn’t a profession that was respected,
society didn’t look kindly on it … That’s why I say football came into my life
by accident.”
Zagallo started off as a left midfielder, wearing the No. 10
shirt, which back then, before Pele, had not yet assumed the significance it
has today.
But intuition told him he was in the wrong place at the
wrong time.
“I saw it would be hard to get into the Brazil side wearing
the No. 10 shirt as there were lots of great players in that position,” he
said.
“So I moved from left midfield to left wing.”
He also moved from America to Flamengo, where he won three
Carioca state championship medals.
The latter half of his career was spent at city rivals
Botafogo, where he won two more state titles.
His first World Cup came in Sweden in 1958, where he started
all six matches and played alongside Garrincha and Pele, who was then just 17.
“I was 27 and Pele was 17,” he said. “That’s why I say that
I never played with him, but that he played with me.”
Four years later in Chile, he was champion again but he only
guaranteed his place after making some tactical alterations.
Zagallo would hang back to help mark the rival full back and
when his side won the ball he would roar up the wing.
It was unusual for forwards to help out in defense and he is
credited with changing the way wingers played the game.
As coach, Zagallo led a string of Brazilian clubs, but he
made his mark when he was drafted to replace the controversial Joao Saldanha as
Brazil coach just months before the 1970 Mexico World Cup.
Brazil’s form had been erratic and they were not fancied,
but Zagallo pulled the star-studded team together, capping a tremendous show
with a memorable 4-1 triumph over Italy in the final.
Zagallo stayed on until 1974, taking Brazil to fourth place
in West Germany, but it was a disappointing performance that was followed by
spells managing clubs back home and national sides in the Middle East.
He was an assistant to Parreira in 1994 when Brazil won
their fourth title, and in 2006, when they were knocked out in the
quarter-finals.
He was also in charge in 1998 when Brazil lost 3-0 to hosts
France in the final after star striker Ronaldo was hit by convulsions just
hours before the match.
The 2006 denouement was a tough one for Zagallo, who had
been unwell in the lead-up to the tournament.
He was clearly finding management a strain and retired from
the game.
Always ebullient and ever popular, he did not disappear from
public view, though, and often appeared on television, at gala awards and
helping out at the CBF.
He married in 1955 to Alcina de Castro and remained with her
until she died in 2012. The couple had four children.
(Reuters/NAN)