Golaço Stories

Few countries in the past have a history as complicated as that of Yugoslavia. However, this complex history has provided soccer fanatics with the interesting story of Dejan Stankovic, a player who has played the FIFA World Cup three times with three different counties. In 1991 Slovenia, Croatia and Macedonia declared their independence from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and this lead to the creation of a rump state known as Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Stankovic, born in Belgrade, would represent FR Yugoslavia in his first World Cup experience in 1998. In 2003, Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independence and what was...

There are no unified rules by the confederation in Brazil regarding championship stars over club crest. Instead, each club individually celebrates what it wants and how it wants. We'll go over some of the most important and unique cases, while keeping in mind the rest of the 700+ professional clubs in Brazil have some variation of these systems. Santos Santos FC has 3 elements over it's crest, 2 stars and a crown. The two star represent the two world championships won in 1962 and 1963. The crown is a recent homage to "The King" Pele, the greatest player in club and sport...

As it always happens before an official jersey release, in early 2018 pictures of China's new away jersey were leaked. The reaction from jersey collectors all over the world was extremely positive, everyone wanted to get their hands on the all black kit with dragon design. Just days before the actual release news started spreading that the Chinese FA had rejected the jersey. On the day of the release fans got to see the red home jersey but the much awaited black away kit was never mentioned. The dragon motif was maintained in the release ceremony, claiming that the yellow sleeves...

Russia's extensive territory is very well known, but just how big it actually is and how it affects the countries soccer scene is not often discussed. This is party due to the fact that most of important cities and wealth in Russia is concentrated in the European side of the country, which then causes most of the top clubs to be from that region. However, a lot of Russian clubs are located well passed the Ural Mountains and deep into the Asian continent. FC Luch Vladivostok is the most extreme example of just how far an away match in Russia...

It is impossible to separate geopolitics and soccer, especially in international competitions. For the 1958 World Cup, in order explain how Wales qualified we first need to talk about what happened in the Africa/Asia region. This was a time where Africa and Asia held joint World Cup Qualifiers due to the low number of teams, combined there were just 9 participants. One of these participants was Israel, and aside from China who got eliminated early by Indonesia, everyone else was a country of Arab majority. Political and religious tensions were high in the region at the time, and as a result...