Brazil. The national championship celebrated its 10th season – still the messy, long, confusing championship. 44 teams participated in the top national level – Taca de Ouro. The teams were selected by record on previous state championship, depending on the berths every state had. Plus the top two teams of the 1980 second level championship or Taca de Prata. With time, the national championship gained authority, but it was still competing with the individual state championships. A lot of football, a lot of trophies, to each their own, for not every team had a chance to play in the national championships. Internationally, such teams were entirely out of sight – naturally, some clubs were unknown anyway, but some were fairly well known. Occasionally, some well known names were lost in the vast Brazilian football universe – old stars, playing in the local state leagues by now, or future stars, making their first steps in professional football. Like Walter Casagrande, playing for Caldense this year.
Casagrande was only 18 years old, playing his second professional season, but Caldense played only state level football this season. For them and many, many other clubs, the only chance of getting national exposure was winning locally. Some clubs were unheard of – like Penapolense.
No matter what, most Brazilian teams were best described by the word ‘exotic’ and Penapolense (Penapolis) is a typical example. Standing from right: Claercio, Caseli, Jonas, Piva, Romero, Quico.
First row: Ribinha, Betinho, Morangueira, Waldir, Luciano.
Some others were barely known, largely because they played now and then in the national championship.
Gama (Brasilia) is one of those – depending on how they performed locally, they had a chance of getting better known. But for that a team had to win its state championship at least and Gama did not.
Taguatinga won the Distrito Federal championship in 1981. Still, exotica…
Moto Clube, the champions of the state of Maranhao, were also one of those somewhat known clubs – the state had one berth in the national championship, so winning the state championship was very important and even in a state like Maranhao there was competition: on national level, it was represented by Sampaio Correa in 1981. A team similar to Moto Clube in terms of fame. It was easier for the ‘bigger’ clubs in the weaker states – in the centre of Brazilian football was much tougher and some quite famous clubs suffered from fierce competition.
Rio Branco was a good example of such unlucky clubs – with the changing focus from state championship to the national, the left out clubs were often losing fame.
Well, slowly Brazil was arriving to the point when the national championship mattered most. Yet, the final table at the end of the season meant absolutely nothing – there was no relegation to fear. Instead, the next year participants were to be selected again by combined criteria: something depended on their 1981 performance and something on the berths their state had. But promotion happened and the second national level had every reason to look up. Since the top football states had the most well clubs, the second level had a big number of clubs more famous than perhaps half of those playing the first level. And for those clubs – strong enough, but having no real chance to compete with, say, Vasco da Gama or Sao Paulo, winning Taca de Prata was the only chance to play top level football.