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Brazil's Taffarel has lived, died in goal
Posted: Wednesday July 01, 1998 11:14 AM
Special from L'Equipe, the French sports daily PARIS
(L'Equipe) -- Claudio André Taffarel was born on September 27, 1988, in
Seoul. When he stopped three penalty shots against Germany in the
Olympics' semifinal, he finally felt like he had become someone. It
didn't last. Maybe he died in November of 1994. He'd just won the World
Cup, in Los Angeles, but he was unemployed. He ended up playing sweeper for
a parish team, in the suburbs of Reggiana, Italy. In one
tournament, he scored 15 goals in seven matches. "It was a strange
feeling. Ending up there, in the countryside, in an unreal situation, while
the whole world had celebrated and honored me a few months before. But
there is no single action, thing that happens to you, no life that makes a
star out of you or puts you in a class of your own. No, there exists no
privileged path to glory and fame. And it's because deep inside I was
convinced of that reality that I put it all in perspective," Taffarel said.
When he was eight, Taffarel was surprised by the Christmas gifts he got
in Santa Rosa, in the Rio Grande Do Sul region, close to the borders of Argentina and
Uruguay. "Gloves and goalkeeper outfits. Systematically. I didn't
understand. For a long time, I'd asked God to make me a great basketball or
volleyball player," he remembered. And he tried hard, thinking, at an early
age, that he had found his way. But when he realized how much higher and
how much more skilled the others were, his determination faded. And he
ended up in goal by chance. "I felt I liked sport but I didn't know in what
position, in what role, I could best express myself. So one day I went to
the Porto Alegre International. I just went straight to the goals and asked
to be tried out," Taffarel said. That was in 1984, and he turned
professional a year later. In 1987, he played in his first match for Brazil. Even
though his rise was exceptionally fast, it didn't strike anyone. "In
Brazil, people dream of sweepers and strikers," he said. "That's all they
talk about. The rest, the other players, they don't count. Goalkeepers even
less."
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Taffarel got his first goalkeeper's kit at the age of eight (AP) |
Well, they talk about them when they make mistakes, and Taffarel
isn't perfect. "Here, people talk about you only when you're bad. If you're
not, they just don't mention your performance. It's logical, they only ask
you to be there," Taffarel said. Critics never really got to him, even
during the 1994 World Cup, when all of Brazil was asking that he be put
aside. He finds appeasement in his faith. "This relationship with God is
strong, powerful. If I have a problem, I live with it. I know tomorrow
things will get better. There is praying, beliefs that allow me to rely on
man's goodness. I don't live in a world of appearances. I work on
developing the gift that God gave me and getting as close to what he's
asking of me as I can," Taffarel said. "There is no pretension in my game,
only a lot of work," he added after a long silence. After his failure in
Italy, which led to his appearances in a parish team, he went back home, in
Porto Alegre, Brazil. "To the whole world, I had disappeared. In Brazil,
people didn't even know who I was anymore. This seven-month lapse did me
some good. It opened my eyes. I became a house husband, started taking care
of my children," Taffarel said. A simple, happy life, spent loving God
and his family, maybe the life that's awaiting him. "After soccer, I want
to be far from it. I want to pray, love, stay home with my folks without
forgetting others," Taffarel said. Far from flashy soccer that leaves the
door open for narcissism. Because to Taffarel there exits a different, more
human kind of soccer. "And in the name of that game, which I still love
today for the emotions it generates when a team is united, I will open a
school for the kids in the neighborhood. But there won't be a career for
me, after." Because careers necessitate plans and often force people to
leave values aside. Taffarel will never sacrifice his soul. That's what he
prays for in Lésigny, as well as for Brazil to go all the way. "If we have
the mental approach we had in 1994, if we keep on developing our technical
skills, if we just play. It's one of our duties, something that's required
of all of us. Because Brazil, with or without us, has the whole world's
backing, when it goes on the pitch. It's something that motivates us. It's
an obligation, to fulfill the expectations of all the people who love us,"
Taffarel explained. A duty that knows no physical borders. When he came
to Paris, Taffarel had two goals, to win a fifth World Cup for Brazil, and
to find a new European team to play for. He just signed a $1.5 million
contract with Galatassaray, in Istanbul, Turkey. That's close enough to
Europe, but there still is some way to go for the World Cup title.
Copyright 1998, L'Equipe
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