Golaço Stories

       In the mid 2000s in the small Brazilian city of Sorocaba something odd was happening. A mysterious North Korean figure appeared, known as Reverend Moon, to spread the word of his church, the Unification Church. In order to get more visibility he decided to back one of the local teams in the city, Atletico Sorocaba, who with his investments gained some national recognition. Simultaneously, the North Korean National Team had qualified for the 2010 World Cup and was struggling to find strong opponents to play friendly matches in preparation for the tournament. Turns out that Reverend Moon...

       In the 2000 Copa Libertadores, current champions Palmeiras were playing at home against Bolivian side The Strongest. In that cold winter night the Brazilians had no problems opening a big lead, and towards the end of the match, with favorable score of 4-0, Palmeiras's massage therapist asked the goalkeeper Marcos if he wanted some water. "Actually, bring me some coffee", he replayed. A few moments later goalkeeper Marcos was sipping some hot coffee mid Copa Libertadores match. Obviously this was was seen as wildly disrespectful by all of Bolivia, however in Brazil the episode was toned down...

       Dejan Petkovic's career followed the script of many Eastern-European players. He started in his towns local team, moved on to national giant Red Star Belgrade, and eventually made his way to Real Madrid. At the time, Real Madrid had too many foreigners on its roster, forcing Petkovic to get loaned out a few times and eventually demoted to the Real Madrid Castilla, the clubs "B Team".  While at Castilla, he played a friendly match against Brazilian club Vitoria and had a phenomenal performance, so much so that Vitoria made an official offer for Petkovic. The Serbian attacking...

       Ronaldo is undoubtedly one of greatest to ever play the game, and his resumé speaks for itself. However, "O Fenomeno" didn't end his career in a glamourous fashion. After decades of glory for the national team and European clubs, in 2009 Ronaldo returned to Brazil to play for Corinthians. His first couple of seasons great, many goals scored and a few trophies lifted, and in 2011 the club had returned to the Copa Libertadores qualifying for the preliminary round just before the group stages. The draw was favorable, they would face Tolima from Colombia, a small team...

      Even though it has star players and historic clubs, La Liga is one of the most predictable leagues in terms of champions. Their domestic cup, the Copa del Rey, isn't very different, even though there is more variety in the champions you still don't see deep runs from lower division teams like you do in other countries. In the 2001/02 season we saw the exception that confirms the rule. UE Figueres, a team from a town of 46,000 people who has never featured in the Spanish top flight, made it to the semi-finals eliminating all-powerful Barcelona along the...