Vinicius Junior astonished the world last Tuesday night with a lambretta cOn which, from the corner, he passed over Nahuel Molina and entered the Argentine area, being shot down by Rodrigo De Paul – was it a penalty? -. And all, in an unbeatable setting: an Argentina-Brazil Classic at the Albiceleste home and with the entire stadium full. And it is that Vinicius Junior is not daunted by anything.
That is well known to its discoverer, Cacau, whom we interviewed this summer in Rio de Janeiro for the America’s Cup. Vini arrived at the Cacau School, one of many that Flamengo sponsors throughout the country, at the age of six. And he stayed until he was 12.
Cacau is from the Sao Gonçalo neighborhood
, which is not just any neighborhood. It is a humble place for the inhabitant and dangerous for the visitor. “Things have gotten worse in recent years,” Cacau told us this summer. But he is proud of his place of growth. Like Vinicius. He was at Escolinha until 2010. For two years (2010-2012), he combined Escolinha and Flamengo, which already recruited him to his quarry. This week, after the lambretta against Argentina, we went again to the magisterium of
Cacau, who has a master’s degree in meeting Vinicius
since childhood. Possibly, he is the most influential person in the player’s career, due to the years they were together and the age at which Vini learned from Cacau at the Escolinha. The lambretta was a surprise to everyone. For Cacau, no:
“I saw her many times since she was little
. He learned it in these fields from his childhood, here in Rio -Cacau tells us from Brazil-. Many of the guys we train who have technique love to ‘fly’ with the ball. So it was not something strange in Vinicius when he was young. “Cacau speaks regularly with his ex-boyfriend, who
he usually visits the Escolinha when he has a few days off
in Rio: “He doesn’t forget the Escolinha. He always shared all his trophies with the boys from here and comes to the neighborhood when he can,” Cacau told us in the aforementioned interview in MARCA last June. The discoverer of the young Madrid player continues his story about the famous lambreta against the Argentines: “Confidence is everything for a player and it shows that his self-esteem is maximum at the moment. That makes his level higher game by game. That, guys with their personality and technique dare to do these dribbles in environments as complicated as Argentina the other day. ” Cacau even remembers
a match in which Vini did that same lambretta:
“It was in the Flamengo quarry, in a match for the Under 17 team and in a Clásico against Vasco da Gama away from home. Vinicius will be a crack. Sure.” It is
word of Cacau,
the person who, in football terms, has accompanied him the most.
