Communism, Nasa and a place for Pelé: how Brazil prepared for the 1970 World Cup
Communism, Nasa and a place for Pelé: how Brazil prepared for the 1970 World Cup. In this extract from their forthcoming book on South America and the World Cup, Mark Biram and Tim Vickery describe la Seleçao’s strange buildup to the classic tournament In January 1969, João Saldanha was appointed as Brazil’s coach.
In this extract from their forthcoming book on South America and the World Cup, Mark Biram and Tim Vickery describe la Seleçao’s strange buildup to the classic tournament In January 1969, João Saldanha was appointed as Brazil’s coach. Saldanha was barely a coach – he had had a brief spell in charge of Botafogo more than a decade earlier.
He was an immensely popular football journalist, who with typewriter or microphone had the fluent gift of communication, talking about the game in language that was both fresh and straightforward, easy to understand. He was a charismatic powerhouse, who claimed to have popped up at many key moments in history, usually in the service of international communism.
Because, yes, at the right-wing height of Brazil’s military dictatorship, a communist was appointed to coach the national football team. João Havelange, the president of the Brazilian sports confederation, knew what he was doing.