Brazil. A brief look at some teams not present in the top 2 leagues this season:
Auto Esporte
Londrina
ABC
Figueirense
Gama
Goiania
Mogi Mirim
Novorizontino
Confianca
Taguatinga
Volta Redonda
Most – if not all – of those clubs played in Serie C in 1990 and perhaps unsatisfied with the low level put pressure for enlargement of Serie B. But there was 1990 Serie C championship and it was won by
Campinense. A title is a title, going along with promotion up. Effectively, Campinense played by the existent rules and fairly promoted, so may be they were not all that happy to see the second level enlarged and teams which they left behind going up along with them.
Olimpia hosted the first leg and won it 2-0.
Olimpia won.
Naturally, the joy was endless.
Mixed feelings in Barcelona (Guayaquil) camp – of course, coming to the final only to lose it was no fun. But it was not a tragedy either – not only it was the first time for the club to reach Copa Libertadores final, but it was the biggest success of Ecuadorian football so far. It was grand achievement for club, city and country, something making everybody proud and thus grieve of the loss was replaced with much more positive attitude.
The success was largely due to the excellent coaching of former Argentine star Miguel Angel Brindisi, who took the reigns in 1989, bringing with himself old, but worthy reinforcements – his coutryman midfielder Marcelo Trobbiani (35 old, coming from Chilean Cobreloa) and the 31 years old Uruguayan striker Luis Acosta (from Ecuadorian Filabanco) in 1989 and in 1990 – one more famed Uruguayan: the 31-years old midfielder Mario Saralegui (from Penarol). May be over the hill for bigger clubs, but the vastly experienced trio was instrumental for Barcelona’s success – although no longer called to their national teams, the veterans brought class and inspiration to Barcelona, also helping Brindisi to emply his tactical schemes and demands.
Compared to their rivals, Olimpia (Asuncion) was very different – they were not newcomers on thebig scene at all – it was their 4th Copa Libertadores final and second in a row. Once they won the Cup already – in 1979. Now, 10 years later they secured a second victory. And well deserved it was, for Olimpia was playing fine for quite some time.
The success was largely due to the good work of two club Presidents – during the reign of Osvaldo Dominguez Dibb Olimpia won its first Copa Libertadores Cup and his successor Oscar Carrismo Neto continued in the same direction, successfully building a new team. Given Paraguayan resources, it was not an easy task and for that – a great, even rare, achievement. There was good base, transition was made carefully and level-headed, depending on home-grown talent and healthy atmosphere. Unlike Barcelona – and most South American clubs, indeed – Olimpia had only Paraguayan players in the squad.
A link with the great success of 1979 was maintained by hiring again the mastermind of the former triumph Luis Cubilla – the Uruguayan, now 50 years old, arrived for his second spell with Olimpia in 1988 and quickly repeated his first solid work. The team, according to the testimonies of the players, was wonderful collective of players who played together for a long time, they grew together as a team, matured and succeeded. Olimpia was well-oiled team, playing attacking football – that comes from everybody of the team asked for recollections, but memory is funny thing: in later years, players said the team was young and that contradicts birthdates: a good number of key players was approaching 30 in 1990 and there were still playing links with the 1979 triumphal squad – Jorge Guasch, for example. The goalkeeper Ever Hugo Almeida must be mentioned, of course: 42-years by now and living legend not only of the club, the naturalized Uruguayan was a great example and motivator for his teammates in both Olimpia and the Paraguayan national team. He was more than solid between the goalposts – particularly instrumental by saving penalties in both regular time and penalty shoot-outs, including the second leg of the final. Almeida retired shortly after the Copa Libertadores victory, but retired as a winner. Players like him and Guasch made the work Cubilla easier, for they were familiar with his style from previous work under him and quickly translated his demands in the dressing room. As a whole, Olimpia made a great transition from one team to another and rightfully came on top of South American football.
Perhaps too fierce, for there was a massive brawl started by America’s Uruguayan coach Carlos Miloc. It could have been the biggest attraction of the contest, disgraceful as it was.
Eventually, America prevailed.
America happily received Copa Interamericana.
Most likely this photo is from the Interamericana contest. Olimpia lost, so nothing much to brag about.
America (Mexico City) won the trophy for 2nd time after winning it in 1977. The club provides some information of the successful contest, but quite minimally – victory deserves some print, but as the trophy was unimportant, nothing more than that. Still, they become double winners of Copa Interamericana. Prevailing over South Americans brings some pride in North America.
Irapuato – last with 37 points.
Atletico Morelia – 4th with 39 points.
Monterrey – 3rd with 42 points.
Cruz Azul – 4th with 33 points.
Santos Laguna (Torreon) – 3rd with 34 points.
UAG (Zapopan) – 4th with 34 points.
Atlas (Guadalajara) – 3rd with 37 points.
Veracruz – last with 34 points.
CD Guadalajara – 3rd with 38 points.
Toluca was eliminated by America 1-1 and 0-3.
Necaxa (Mexico City) eliminated by UNAM 0-0 and 1-3.
UAT Correcaminos was dramatically eliminated by… the rules. They won the first leg against Puebla 3-1, but lost the second with the same result. Puebla went ahead because of better first-stage record.
UANL was eliminated by U de G 3-2 and 1-3.
America (Mexico City) lost to U de G 0-2 and 2-1.
UNAM (Mexico City) lost to Puebla 4-4 and 2-4.
Universidad de Guadalajara – or Leones Negros – had very strong season, but at the end failed to win the championship. Small differences, but not in their favour.
Puebla triumphed and it was well deserved victory – the team was the third strongest in the first stage, which helped them in the ¼ finals – the only kind of shaky performance in the season, but after that they prevailed to the very end. Their total record was 21 wins, 13 ties, 10 losses, scoring 75 goals and receiving 56.
Thus, Puebla won its 2nd title and, naturally, the squad was solid, if not particularly famous outside Mexico: just the name a few, Pablo Larios, Marcelino Bernal, Jose de la Torre were well respected national team players, Brazilian striker Edevaldo provided foreign strength and the club acquired the Paraguayan star Julio Cesar Romero from Spanish FC Barcelona for this season. He was the most famous player in the squad, but he was no longer young, and more or less, a pale shadow of his former self – Moreno was already 33-years old and after the season departed for his country to play for Sportivo Luqueno. Yet, he added a Mexican title to his sporting achievements.
Possible picture of Inter of this season. Typically, new owners had ambitious plans and the new team – but old franchise – did well. How well second place was for the owners remained to be seen, though – success had to be immediate and without it… Mexican football history showed a long list of names with meteoric short existence.
Leon (Leon) won the Second Division championship for the first time. A new trophy was fine, but the aim of the club was to return to top flight as quickly as possible and they succeeded. Back to familiar grounds next season.
Newcomers Kitchener Spirit dressed fashionably after the German team.
Hamilton Steelers. They only showed that Canadian football was concentrated in the West and even not the whole West, but just in the city of Vancouver.
The champions left no photo of themselves – at least not one in wider circulation – which was an ample testimony of the real popularity and importance of football in the country. Vancouver 86ers was clearly the best club in the country in every detail, which made them dominant – 3rd title in a row.
CS Herediano – 5th.
CS Uruguay de Coronado – 3rd. Standing from left: William Mejía, Ronny Díaz, José Luis Guillén Gallardo, Carlos Vivó Quirós, Miguel Jasper Simpson Lacey, Rodolfo Jarret. Crouching : Juan Morales, Guillermo Guardia, ?, Franco Benavides, Ronald Salazar.
LD Alajuelense – 2nd.
CD Saprissa – 1st. Standing from left: Geovanny Ramírez, Alexis Camacho, Benjamín Mayorga, Geraldo Da Silva, Evaristo Coronado, Eddy Picado. First row: Roger Flores, José Jaikel, Vladimir Quesada, Víctor Badilla.
America won the final.
Pinar del Rio played a second CONCACAF final in a row and no doubt the team did their best, but the difference in class was enormous. In any case, this was perhaps the highest moment in Cuban football – two consecutive CONCACAF finals – so, nothing to be ashamed of, but the contrary.
Sure winners and perhaps America even allowed their Cuban opponent to get a draw in the first leg, but that was all grace or pity could permit. America won the continental trophy for 3rd time.
The formula was as follows – the preliminary round went rather complicated group round-robin tournaments hosted by one country each. Group 2, played in Bahrain, doubled the Gulf Cooperation Council Club Tournament and one team actually had no right to play in the Champions’ Cup, so its results mattered only for GCCCT, but… on them also depended who will qualify in the next round of the Champions’ Cup. After the preliminary qualification groups the semifinals followed in the same fashion: 11 teams were divided into 2 groups, played in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Group A, and Group B in Jakarta, Indonesia. The group winners qualified to the final, played in the usual two legs, home and away. Three teams withdrew (Al Deffatain – Amman, Al Muharraq – Bahrain, and Al Arabi – Kuwait) – the reasons, as usual, were political. Nissan FC (Japan) won the reduced Group A and Liaoning (China) – Group B, and went to the final. Interestingly, both teams played against each other already, both qualifying from the preliminary Group 5. Liaoning won the group back then, but the Japanese scored 11 goals in 3 games, permitting only 1 in their net – it was the winning goal Liaoning against Nissan, making them group winners. The final was really between equal opponents and once again 1 goal was the crucial difference: Liaoning won the first leg at home 2-1 and then kept 1-1 tie at Yokohama.
Liaoning triumphed and celebrated their victory in Communist style. Kind of.
Nissan FC – or Nissan Motors (Yokohama) reached the final for the first time and lost minimally. Sad, but not that bad at all. Japanese football was already going into full professionalism, there were foreign players, and the whole structure was going into massive reorganization – which included changes of names and new league, the J-League. Very soon after playing the Asian final Nissan FC would be no more – at least under that name. From the perspective of the professional reorganization of Japanese football, the relative success of Nissan FC was just a sign confirming the need of such a change: it was clearly the right time to move up a step.
Liaoning brought the first club success for Chinese football, confirming its improvement, which was mostly organizational. Since China was lagging behind South Korea and Japan, the success was mostly a boost, showing the right direction. As a club, Liaoning already had experience – they played at the Champions’ Cup final in 1986-87, when it was a group round-robin format and finished 3rd among the four finalists. This time they were winners, becoming in a way a motor for the Chinese organization of professional football and establishing themselves as a leading club. Historic victory not just for the club, but for the whole Chinese football.
Such was charm of the World Cup’s ‘discovery’ and instant international fame of practically retired player. And because of the Cameroonian success, a tiny anonymous club from tiny anonymous country also became known, as if to play one more joke on modern football. For, if anything, Milla still had some kind of a club he played for and records require writing down… Roger Milla, Cameroon and Saint-Pierroise (Saint-Pierre, Reunion). After retiring from professional football, Milla kind of settled in the small island in the Indian Ocean and kicked the ball a bit for fun with the local team. And since he kicked the ball, he was not retired, wasn’t he? Saint-Pierroise won the championship of Reunion as it was, so Milla won a trophy too – hard to argue he was a retiree after his World Cup fame, which eventually brought some light on his playing activities during the year. Anyhow, those amusing facts and questions meant very little after he surprised the world, became instantly everybody’s darling, and outperformed much younger great starts collecting huge paychecks from European big clubs.
After all, it was not Milla’s winning the championship of Reunion, but his World Cup performance and goals, instrumental for the best ever African performance at World Cup finals and propelling Cameroon to the ¼ finals – and almost to the ½ finals. Of course, his first goal against Colombia remains immortal, even if Rene Hiquita’s arrogance is largely to blame. At the end, Milla deserved to be continental player of the year more than anybody else – and it was the second time he was voted number 1 African player – the first time was in 1976, solely based on the successful performance of his already third club: Tonnere (Yaounde). This success propelled him to professional football in France, where he played for 5 clubs in 10 years without getting much notice: funny in way, but Milla was voted African number one when playing for amateur African clubs, but not when playing professionally in France. And he was discovered twice – the first time at 24, when he was noticed by professional French clubs, and second time, when he 38 years old and retired. Amazing comeback, which was really comeback, for Milla left Reunion and returned to active playing in Cameroon at the end of 1990 and played until 1996 for Tonnere (Yaounde) and abroad, adding one more World Cup and new records. It was not a Cinderella story – it was granddad story, unique. Unique even in terms of the rising of African football: 1990 was the last year the African player of the year was actually playing for African club – after that will be only players playing for big European professional clubs voted best. To a point – perhaps a big point – Milla made African players valuable and truly recognized.