Football Journey

No mystery in Europe – Franz Beckenbauer was voted the Player of the Year.

The great rivalry Cruiff or Beckenbauer was established… well, who was best? The attacker or the defenseman? It is futile… but really: Ajax won every possible cup in 1972. West Germany won the European title without any Dutch seen around. Club football or national teams competitions? And what is this attack versus defense? Neither Cruiff was traditional attacker, nor Beckenbauer traditional defenseman. However unjust, the choice was just – Beckenbauer was on the top world scene since 1966. Cruiff – only a club star so far. Beckenbauer was great in 1972. Was he the greatest? Who cares… voting is never truly objective. Nothing is ever really objective. Impasse.

And somehow it is clear why Beckenbauer was number one in 1972.

In 1972 South American Footballer of the Year went to Teofilo Cubillas. Cubillas is probably the best Peruvian player of all time, but still it is hard to figure out why he was awarded. Cubillas still played for Alianza (Lima), which is perhaps the biggest club in Peru, but at least internationally it was not a success. Alianza’s rival Universitario reached the Libertadores Cup final, but this is no reason for voting Cubillas. Since the event is distant now and South American football was hardly featured in early 1970s Europe, the election of Cubillas is enigma to me. It could have been inertia of the surprisingly strong performance of Peru at World Cup 1970. It could have been strong season of the player. Something does not much, though – Cubillas moved to Europe in 1973, but not to big club – he went to Switzerland. His teammate in the national squad, who is not considered the best ever Peruvian player, but a drunk – Hugo Sotil – was the very first purchase Barcelona made after the Spanish Federation lifted the ban on foreign players. The mystery remains, but it is insightfull to know that the King of Football was not worthy for this award already a second year. Something like a Brazilian crisis perhaps? Something like Uruguayan decline? Something like an Argentine wrong direction? Something like Chileans been eternal wannabes? Something like… non existent Colombians, despite having Alfredo di Stefano playing for them once upon a time?

Questions are questions, but Teofilo Cubillas was great player. Overall, if not that particular year.

Cubillas (on the ground) scoring against Morocco (I think) at World Cup 1970. Since I don’t really know why he was voted Footballer of the Year in 1972, he better stays on his bottom – I want to keep the mystery.

One last South American stop: Chile. The local powerhouse Colo-Colo from the capital Santiago de Chile won yet another title in 1972. Should this trivia be mentioned at all?

Why not? This squad was the first Chilean team I saw. Thrilled by the expansion of my football geography, I searched further and eventually learned that the club is named after famous Indian chief. So rebellion and resistance were part and parcel of the attractiveness of the club. Correspondingly, the most popular Chilean club. And again correspondingly, the most successful Chilean club – which is the point where resistance ends and shrewed business begins… In 1972 Colo-Colo were international mediocrity, but wait for later years. At the moment – go back to earlier postings and take one more look at 1974 scandals.

Here is Carlos Caszelly, one of the best ever Chilean players and committed leftist. Two years before General Pinochet ended the supposed socialist paradise for Caszelly. Two year before football made the most weird truce of political enemies – Pinochet agreeing to tolerate the Left Winger, because he is great right winger for Chile; and Caszelly agreeing to remain Left Winger playing for Right Winger dictator in the name of the same country.

And Brazil? Judging by the second national championship, the samba of the World Champions from 1970 was gone. Palmeiras (Sao Paulo) won the national title, but it was a team playing unattractive football. Unattractive to most Brazilians, that is.

Back, left to right: Eurico, Leao, Dudu, Luis Pereira, Alfredo, Zeca

Front: Edu, Leivinha, Paulo Cesar Carpegiani, Ademir da Guia, Nei

Palmeiras are one of the biggest and most successful Brazilian clubs, of course. They were not well known to Europeans – largely due to the fact that the club is from Sao Paulo and apart from Santos, best known to Europeans clubs were Rio de Janeiro ones. Naturally, people from Rio are not terribly fond of Sao Paulo clubs. On top of it Palmeiras is the club of the Italian immigrants, originally named Palestra Italia. During the Second World War the club was forced to change its name for political reasons (rather arbitrary exercise of state political correctness, because clubs with German names were not forced to change theirs) and became Palmeiras. As an ethnic club, it is seen as elitist and exclusive, although neither fan base, nor players support that – and not in the early 1970s either. The whole ethnic issue is ambiguous – fans hardly draw fine ethnic lines, but still tend to support clubs along ethnic lines. Club administration claims both ethnic pride and ethnic-blindness, often at once, so it hard to tell. Palmeiras were both lucky and unlucky, though. Their champion team was solid: Leao, the best Brazilian goalkeeper in the 1970s and most of the 1980s, Edu, Luis Pereira, Leivinha, Paulo Cesar Carpegiani (not to be confused with Paulo Cesar Lima, World champion of 1970), and the captain Ademir da Guia played for the national team. Eurico was considered a great promise. But… Eurico ended as a promise; Leivinha, proclaimed to be the next Pele never came even close; Paulo Cesar Carpegiani was never considered a real star, Edu was invited to the national team, only to be dismissed immediately, Leao refused to play for Tele Santana’s Brazil’82, Luis Pereira is not a name readily mentioned by Brazilians, and Ademir da Guia… was one of the most underappreciated players in history of football.

The trouble of Palmeiras was in part timing, and, in part, their radical tactical change. Palmeiras decided to follow European tactics and approaches – the club felt Brazilian football was no longer supreme and new concepts were to be adopted. It was not total football what they decided to coppy, but the German physical game. And Palmeiras played disciplined, tough football, where the defenseman Luis Pereira was more or less the key player. Brazilian fans did not like such bland and businesslike football. But Leao, Luis Pereira, Leivinha, Paulo Cesar Carpegiani, and Ademir da Guia were the core of the Brazilian national team for World Cup 1974, which was to play European football. It was miserable failure and as a result nobody (with the exception of Leao) was ever considered great. Not only that – again with the exception of Leao, nobody else was invited often to the national team after 1974. As for Leao, he was the only decent Brazilian goalkeeper in the 1970s, and as a goalie, he wanted strong defense in front of him. Most likely his refusal to play for Tele Santana was based on Santana’s attacking football, to which defense was secondary at best.

Paulo Cesar Carpegiani probably fell out of favour by association – he was inventive and technical midfileder, not at all dull, but been part of the terrible 1974-team, he was discarded with the rest.

Ademir da Guia is an entirely different story of ill luck. The son of legendary Domingos da Guia, one of the biggest world stars of first half of 20^th century (who are generally lost to us, because of the World War II), Ademir started his career with Bangu, the Rio-based club where the elder da Guia played most of his own career. Ademir was 17 years old in his first season, 1959. The age suggest plenty of talent – quickly noticed by the bigwigs of Palmeiras, who bought the young attacking midfielder in 1961. Ademir da Guia played for Palmeiras to the end of his career in 1977, and is perhaps the biggest club legend. He was a big star of Brazilian football as well, the world heard very little about him – Ademir da Guia fell victim of plentitude: between 1965 and 1974 he played only 9 games for the national team, most of them in the ill-fated 1974, when he was already 32 years old. Unfortunately for da Guia-son, Brazil had too many great players almost to the end of his career. He coincided with Didi, Pele, Zagallo, Jairzinho, Tostao, Gerson, Rivelino, to name but few of his competition, who either older and more experienced than him, or younger and therefore more promising than him. If Ademir da Guia played at different post, say left winger, he would have been constant feature of the national team. But he was attacking midfielder… Brazil was exceptionally rich there and Ademir da Guia most often was not even considered. He was elegant and clever player, but when finally invited in the national team, he was getting old and it was horrible team. Ademir da Guia did not impress anybody in 1974… His consolation were the two titles Palmeiras won before the horror. What consolation? The horror of 1974 was blamed on the boring ‘European’ football Palmeiras played in 1972 and 1973… or so think the fans.

Independiente won Libertadores Cup in may 1972. The club is interesting in several respects: they were not well known in Europe, yet, they already won two Libertadores Cups – in 1964 and 1965. Their third cup was contested by Universitario (Lima, Peru), a team featuring some Peruvian national players from World Cup 1970 (Ballesteros, Rojas, and Ramirez) but only one star – Chumpitaz. Since no club from Peru was ever among the grands of South American football, the success was more or less on the wings of the good World Cup peformance: more carried on enthusiasm than real strength. It is next to impossible to say how good Universitario were, but certainly they gave headache to Independiente:

Final (May 17 & 24)

Universitario Per Independiente Arg 0-0 1-2 1-2

1st leg. Estadio Nacional, Lima, 17- 5-1972

Universitario – Independiente 0-0

Universitario: Ballesteros, Soría, Cuellar, Chumpítaz, Luna, Techera,

Carbonell (Uribe), Castañeda, Ramírez, Rojas, Bailetti.

Independiente: Santoro, Commisso, Sá, Garisto, Pavoni, Pastoriza, Raimondo,Semenewicz, Balbuena, Mircoli, Saggioratto (Bulla).

Referee: Marques (Brazil)

Attendance: 45,000

2nd leg. Cordero, Avellaneda, 25- 5-1972

Independiente – Universitario 2-1

6′ Maglioni 1-0

61′ Maglioni 2-0

79′ Rojas 2-1

Independiente: Santoro, Commisso, Sá, Garisto, Pavoni, Pastoriza, Raimondo, Semenewicz, Balbuena, Maglioni, Saggioratto (Mircoli).

Universitario: Ballesteros, Soría, Cuellar, Chumpítaz, Luna, Techera

(Alva), Cruzado, Castañeda, Munante, Rojas, Ramírez (Bailetti).

Referee: Favilli Neto (Brazil)

Attendance: 55,000

Third time winners of Libertadores (Thanks to Igor Nedbaylo for the photo!):

Indenpendiente is confusing club both geographically and in terms of fame. To most football aficionados Argentine football is River Plate and Boca Juniors – everything else fades behind the two world famous clubs from Buenos Aires. But in 1972 Independiente was often presented to curious Europeans as the most popular Argentine club. It may had been so back than – on one hand, fandom was not yet consolidated around two or three clubs and not only in Argentina – many clubs still had significant number of supporters, following traditional lines of neighbourhoods and cities. Massive consolidation came later. On the other hand, Independiente is a geographic puzzle: sometimes they are listed as club from Buenos Aires, but just as often Avallaneda is given as their home town. In fact, they belong to Buenos Aires only if we speak of Greater Buenos Aires – Avallaneda is incorporated into the megapolis, yet it preserves distinctness. It is not suburbia, outskirts, or even township – it is part of the whole called Buenos Aires, but preserving local pride and identity. Certainly bigger than a neighbourhood or even city district, yet not exactly separate entity. Finally, situated between Buenos Aires proper and La Plata, Avalleneda curiously serves La Plata – further away from the centre of the metropolis, La Plata is always taken as a distinctly separate city thanks to the vague border area called Avallaneda: at least in football, clubs are from La Plata, although there is no visible separation between this city and Greater Buenos Aires. Anyhow, going back to the issue of popularity, Indenpendiente may had been easily the most popular Argentine club at the time – no less than 9 clubs from Buenos Aires played in the first division in 1971, half of the 19-team league, that is, and not counting second and third division clubs. Buenos Aires is probably the city with most football clubs in the world, most of them old, with well established fan base thanks to combination of neighbouring pride and Argentine peculiarity – clubs are not simply clubs, but actually community centers with many activities, one among them – the professional football team. The most important one, but just one among many other activities nevertheless. This peculiarity attaches clubs to politics, which at the end makes fans out of people who may be supporting the club for political rather than purely sporting reasons. At least that was the general picture back in the early 1970s and although River Plate and Boca Juniors were traditionally the most popular Buenos Aires clubs, they still had to compete with many other clubs for the potential pool of supporters. Avallaneda was different story: the total number of local clubs was much smaller and competition with Buenos Aires concentrated fans to one of the two big local clubs – Racing Club and Independiente. Thus, it was very likely Independiente to have had more supporters than River or Boca in total numbers. Besides, the 1960s were not the best years of either giant – River Plate did not win a single title between 1957 and 1975. Boca Juniors won 5 titles in 1960s, but their record is checkered – no clear dominance and no international success. In contrast, Racing Club, Independiente, and Estudiantes (La Plata) won 6 Libertadores cups during the 1960s. 1972 was just the beginning of continental domination for Independiente – they won 4 Libertadores Cups in succession, which is South American record. Indenpendiente also won most Libertadores Cups so far – 7 in total. As it is, hardly small potatoes.

The team featured good number of Argentine national players – Sa, Balbuena, Pastoriza, Santoro, Semenewicz and was captained by Uruguayan star – Ricardo Elbio Pavoni. Pastoriza was part of the revived European import of South Americans, starting in 1972, but as a whole Independiente preserved the winning team, eventually adding more talent. In 1972 they were welcoming change – at least for South Americans – after the dreadful years of ugly Estudiantes and not exactly flying Nacional (Montevideo). They appeared elegant, attacking and, in contrast to the mentioned above teams, modern. To European eye, they were rather the same old story – brutal tricksters, naturally technical, but with no real spark. Tough and well organized team, but light years away from the beauty of total football. Which was true is difficult to figure out – Independiente did not dominate Argentine football, yet they dominated South America and were successful against European clubs too. However, Brazilian clubs were in various difficulties during the best part of the 1970s, and the Uruguayans were steadily declining as well, so the usual competition was not great in South America. Ajax refused to play the Intercontinental Cup in 1973 and Bayern also refused in 1975, so Independiente did not meet the best European clubs either. But numbers are numbers… and Independiente is the King of Cups in South America. So far.