Michael Batson

While Pelé of Santos was Brazil’s most famous, most respected player of all time, arguably it was Garrincha of Botafogo who was the most loved and admired. Of mixed race with Indian blood, he was deformed from birth with his left leg curved outward and the right leg bent inward. His career and life sadly were marked by tragedy and ruination and Botafogo, where he spent the bulk of his career, treated him badly. Barely literate, the club made him sign blank contracts, which they then filled in with salaries as low as they could get away with. They also promised him money that they never paid. Garrincha it was said earned less that his teammates despite being the club’s main attraction in an era when a club’s income came almost solely from gate receipts.

Mané (short for Manuel) Garrincha (“Little Bird”), the home dressing room at the Maracanã is named for him, and Pelé first played together for Brazil at the 1958 World Cup and from then on, with them playing together, the national team never lost a match. In Chile, with Pelé injured, Garrincha singlehandedly won Brazil the 1962 World Cup becoming in the process the first player to win the Golden Boot, the Golden Ball, and the World Cup all in the same tournament. Later in 1962 Garrincha lived the most glorious moment in domestic football, Botafogo’s second consecutive state championship. This was also his peak. By then his knee cartilage was ruined because of his deformity; his bones would grind together, never mind the sporting violence. After a knee operation in 1964, he was never the same player again, and was well past his best when called up for the 1966 World Cup where Brazil performed poorly exiting at the group stage. When he retired, he was broke having neither savings nor income. He barely gave interviews and rarely expressed an opinion. The man without a voice. When he died at age 49, millions turned out for his funeral procession.

Another Botafogo player of that era was Afonsinho (Afonso Celso Garcia Reis) a midfielder of exceptional quality. Alfonsinho joined Botafogo in 1965 from São Paulo’s Esporte Clube XV de Novembro de Jaú, a second division club. The Botafogo hierarchy however took exception to his unconventional appearance and outspoken views – he looked like one of Castro’s revolutionaries and believed fervently in labour rights – Brazil was being run by an authoritarian military dictatorship at the time, and players got little say in the work place. Afonsinho fought a long legal battle with Botafogo and in 1971 won the right to negotiate his own services to change clubs without the need for outside interference or approval – a battle for player rights first taken up by Vasco’s outstanding midfielder Fausto in the 1930s. In doing so, he blazed a trail for Brazilian footballers of future generations to exercise their own labour rights and maintain firmer control over their own careers. Because of his outspoken views, Afonsinho was never selected to play for Brazil’s national team. Later he qualified as a doctor and still finds time to coach young football players near his home on Paquetá Island, a car-free island where everyone gets about on bicycles near Rio in Guanabara Bay. Aside from Botafogo he also played for Santos, Flamengo, and Fluminense among other clubs and is featured in Al Jazeera’s series “Football Rebels’ hosted by Eric Cantona.

The Botafogo team of 1967-1968 with Mário Zagallo as coach won the Rio de Janeiro title and the Guanabara Cup and the first Brazilian championship (Brazil Cup) in 1968. They had Jairzinho (played 1961-74), who had replaced Garrincha on the wing and was nicknamed “The Hurricane” by the Botafogo supporters. Heavily muscled and the fastest man in the Brazil squad over 50m, Jairzinho became the first and only player to score in every round of a World Cup finals and go on to win the tournament. He had a reputation of being difficult. Researching his book on the 1970 Brazilians, ‘The Beautiful Team” Garry Jenkins interviewed all surviving members of the World Cup winning team except for Jairzinho who insisted on being paid for his time; “It’s a professional thing”. Even Pelé, then Special Minister for Sports, offered his time for free. After football, Jairzinho moved into a career as an agent rather than a manager. His most spectacular discovery was Ronaldo.

In the centre of the midfield, they had recruited Gérson (1963-70) from rivals Flamengo, as successor to the great Didi. Gérson joined Botafogo after being given the near impossible task of having to mark Garrincha in two successive Carioca Championship finals: if you can’t beat them join them. Gérson became understudy to his great idol Didi in the prized midfield role first with club and then with the national team. He was nicknamed Canhotinha de ouro (“Golden Left Foot”) for his laser-like passing and Papagaio, “the parrot”, because he talked a lot and was never short of an opinion on most things. Pelé may have been the star of Brazil’s World Cup winning team, but it was Gérson who pulled the strings.

Two other Botafogo players were part of Brazil’s qualification for the 1970 World Cup in Mexico. Rogério Hetmanek (Rogério), a winger, was known as the 23rd player of the World Cup squad and Roberto (Roberto Lopes de Miranda) nicknamed Vendaval (the “Gale”) who played over 350 games for the club and made the squad for Mexico coming on in the matches against England and Peru. Rogerio rivalled his teammate Jairzinho for a place in Mexico, but the former’s indifferent form and injury worries effectively ended his challenge.

The other Botafogo player to play in Mexico was Paulo Cézar Caju. He first made his mark in Colômbia and was on Flamengo’s books at 16. His explosive temper and playboy reputation made him a controversial figure in Brazil. People wondered about Paulo Cézar ’s adaptability to Zagallo’s two-shirted (dual role) philosophy – covering back when possession was lost for which he was reluctant. He was Gérson’s understudy, the unofficial number 12. Despite playing brilliantly against England and Romania when Gérson was injured, Paulo Cézar didn’t play another match in Mexico. According to Paulo Cézar, it was his job to get the match ball after the Final, but the Italian Angelo Domenghini beat him to it, so the Brazilian slapped it out of his hands and ran-off. At the post-match banquet, the two almost came to blows. The match ball had been intended for a church, Nossa Serihora da Aparecida but according to Paulo Cézar it later wound up win the hands of a businessman.

Later Paulo Cézar became playmaker for Brazil at the 1974 World Cup in West Germany. Following retirement, he made appearances on the veteran Masters’ circuit and on what Carioca’s call “football society” a social circuit. He was Jairzinho’s most regular partner at the beach volleyball games on Ipanema and Copacabana following the 1970 World Cup. He could sometimes be found at social kickarounds at a smart sports club at the foot of the mountains near the Lagoa area. Today Paulo Cézar is regarded as something of a lost soul – a slightly bitter figure. When researching his book, whenever Paulo Cézar’s name came up Jenkins said people would either smile or shake their heads ruefully.

The 1960s were successful years for Botafogo but these good times with trophies were followed in the 1970s and 1980s by barren times. In 1971, the year following Brazil’s World Cup triumph, Botafogo lost the state title to arch-rivals Fluminense at the Maracanã in front of 140,000 fans. In the final game, Luiz Ribeiro Pinto Neto (Lula) the Fluminense winger scored two minutes from time, when the nil-all draw was enough for the Glorioso to win the title. The fatal goal came after a foul by the Fluminense wing-back Marco Antônio on goalkeeper Botafogo’s goalkeeper Ubirajara Mota but the referee José Marçal Filho, after much discussion, decided against awarding a free-kick. That goal, still contested today, stigmatised Marçal for the rest of his life, but it also marked the beginning of a 20-year drought for Botafogo, which would only be broken in 1989.

Botafogo’s ordeal was not just limited to on the pitch. Off the field the club saw its headquarters and its famous stadium sold, in 1976, to Vale do Rio Doce (the world’s largest producer of iron ore and nickel), as payment for tax debts. During this period, Botafogo transferred to Marechal Hermes, a suburb in the northwest of Rio far from their home by the sea. During the club’s time there they won the Carioca title in 1989 in the second game against Flamengo with a goal by their prolific striker Maurício (de Oliveira Anastácio) ending the club’s 21-years drought without a title.

The 1990s saw the good times return. In 1995 Botafogo won the Brazilian Championship in the final against Santos. This was followed by Rio state titles in 1997, 2006, 2010, 2013, and 2018. In 1993, they won Conmebol in an electrifying final against Peñarol of Uruguay in the Maracanã, a match decided on penalties after a dramatic 2-2 draw in normal time. The 1995 Brasileiro followed, in another dramatic final, this time against Santos: 2-1 in the first game at the Maracanã with goals by Gottardo and Túlio, and a 1-1 draw at the Pacaembu in São Paulo, with a goal by Túlio Maravilha. They could have added to their titles earlier in 1992, when, after leading the entire championship, Botafogo managed by Renato Gaúcho who played and managed nearly all the top teams in Brazil, many more than once, they lost to Flamengo: over two legs.

In 1996, Botafogo won the Cidade Maravilhosa Cup (the “Cup of the Marvellous City”, named for Rio de Janeiro) undefeated with six wins and one draw. In the same year, they won the Tereza Herrera Cup (an annual pre-season tournament hosted in Galicia, Spain), defeating hosts Deportivo La Coruña and Juventus from Italy. In 1997, after a spectacular campaign, Botafogo won the Carioca Championship again, defeating Vasco in the second game 1-0 with a goal by Dimba, thereafter dubbed “the goal of Dimbalada”. To reach the title, they won the Guanabara Cup winning all 12 games (two of them over Vasco) and the Rio Cup unbeaten in eight games, the final of which was against old rivals Fluminense. But there was also a huge disappointment: in front of 111,000 Alvinegro fans, the biggest crowd seen at the famous stadium in Rio in some years Botafogo drew with Esporte Clube Juventude from Caxias do Sul, a city and a club founded by Italians in Rio Grande do Sul, in the final of the Copa do Brazil, but losing the title under the existing format.

The new century did not start well for Botafogo. In 2002, after a poor campaign, the club was relegated to the Second Division (Série B) of the Brazilian Championship. The club then entered a serious political and financial crisis but returned to Serie A in 2003. These events reflected the chaotic state of football in Brazil. From the years 1971 to 2002 the Brazilian league changed every year with some years more eccentric than others. Constantly changing rules devalued the league’s credibility, which is reflected in low attendances. A rule was introduced in 1999 to protect the big clubs from unfair eventualities like relegation, but even that failed as both Fluminense and then Botafogo were relegated. Fluminense, Botafogo’s oldest rivals, wound up one year playing in the third division. The end of the dictatorship did not take the politics out of the national league. It was shaped by a culture of vested interests, and it has continued that way.

In 1999 Botafogo were again facing relegation to division two. When they need to Brazilians always find a way around the rules: laws exist to be subverted. The club appealed to the Sport Supreme Court the judicial power of Brazilian football regarding an opposition player in a game against São Paulo who had been registered under a fraudulent birth certificate. The Court, which constitutionalise the defence of the large Rio clubs’ interests over the common good, ruled in its decision, which twisted the tournament’s original rules, saw Botafogo awarded three points and stayed up at the expense of Gama (Sociedade Esportiva do Gama) a small club from Brasilia. Brazilian society is marked by unfairness against the less privileged and this is reflected in football.

In 2006, Botafogo, with coach Carlos Roberto de Carvalho, a club great with 442 appearances (1967-75), they won Carioca again after beating América 3-1 in the Guanabara Cup, and 2-0 and 3-1 against Madureira, in the title decider. In 2007, Botafogo moved home again, this time to play its matches in the Olympic Stadium, built for the 2007 Pan American Games. Known as Engenhão, due to its location in the Engenho de Dentro neighborhood, in the North Zone of the city, the stadium was inaugurated on 30 June 2007 with Botafogo’s victory: 2-1 over its oldest rival, Fluminense. Today, the stadium has been renamed Estádio Nilton Santos after the Botafogo great, a pioneer of the modern wing-back.

In 2010, Botafogo again took the Rio State title despite suffering a heavy 6-0 defeat to Vasco. With the arrival of manager Joel Santana, O Glorioso completed the double winning both the Taça Guanabara and the Campeonato Carioca. In the last game, the final of the Rio Cup, they beat Flamengo 2-1. They won again in 2013, Botafogo completed a triple, again winning the Rio Championship, the Taça Guanabara and Taça Rio. That year the club was crowned land and sea champion, also achieving success in the Carioca Rowing Championship. In 2018, Botafogo again became Land and Sea Champion. They were again relegated to Serie B in 2020 but won back promotion to the topflight in 2021.

These days the club is 90 percent owned by a US businessman who also has shares in other clubs internationally such as Crystal Palace in the English Premier League and Olympic Lyonnaise in Ligue 1, and is coached by the former Wolverhampton Wanderers manager, Bruno Lage. The playing squad is largely made up of Brazilians, but also includes players from Paraguay, Argentina, Uruguay, Spain, Nicaragua, and one from another former Portuguese colony, Angola. The famous black and white shirt is now made by Reebok a company founded in Bolton in the north of England but itself owned by Americans, and the front of the shirt besmirched with the name of a betting agency. Last year Botafogo finished mid-table in the Campeonato Brasileiro Série A and fourth of 12 teams in the Rio state competition, the Campeonato Carioca. Botafogo again won the Taça Rio for the eighth time in 2023. The great players may be gone but the legend lives on with the Alvinegro Carioca, Rio’s black and whites at the University of Football.