Ok -- Clube Atletico Joseense is based in Sao Jose dos Campos in Sao Paulo state in Brazil. The "2nd division" is extremely misleading, however. Brazil plays a split season -- half national leagues, half state leagues. If you do well in your state league you can qualify for Serie C and move up the national ladder (note: Serie C is going to become a regular league soon and a new Serie D will serve as the big qualifying tournament). Joseense is not in the national ladder. They play in the Sao Paulo state league system in "Serie B" otherwise known as the "Segunda Division" -- except Sao Paulo has a division A1, A2, and A3, so playing at Serie B is actually the fourth level of the Sao Paulo leagues (aka Campeonato Paulista). The fourth level of a state league can't be that high a standard, but at least Sao Paulo state is one of the strongest in Brazil and many of A1's clubs play somewhere in the national structure. I suppose it's better than playing in Acre's fourth division.
I'm glad you made sense of that. I looked up the team on wikipedia but couldn't figure out what league they were in. I checked the leagues...nothing. The team did show up when I looked at team in Brazil, broken down by state.
Police Auxillary League... bush league, all amature league whatever you want to call it.... Tone Capone, maybe an honest mistake but this was not really a worthy YA got a PROFESSIONAL contract in BRAZIL post. Geez, the USA has simillar adult leagues all over the United States in Pennsylvania, New York, California etc....Not worthy of posting that someone may or may not have gotten a shot at being included on some remote team, in some neighborhood, in some town in Sao Paolo. Lets keep this real. Bet most or all their players don't even get paid. Someone may be over inflating the accomplishment. If you have been to brazil you could imagine how far down the list of obscurity some of these teams can actually be and under what poor conditions they live and play. Sorry, this at present is not a story of Professional YA in Brazil.
The other mods, who've been around longer than I have, might disagree but I have no problem with him posting the story here. At the very least, it resulted in more than a few of us learning a little more about the way leagues in Brazil work. I don't see any value in arbitrarily excluding a story about a real attempt by a US player to hook up with a team in Brazil. And since it was brought to us in good faith I don't see any point in jumping down the guy's throat about it.
And since when have we scoffed at following any players who ply their trade abroad, be it in Finland, Nepal, or Swaziland? For my money, these stories are half of what makes the YA forum great.
Ouch. Returning to the topic, it is always interesting to read of Americans or Europeans going to play in Brazil. It's not that there are too many Yanks in Brazil, is it?
Hey, no swipe at Finland meant! Quite the contrary, since I've been involved in translating lots of articles about YA's over there. I was simply referring to some of the more far-flung places where we've had players.
I agree. There are probably Brazilians in most of the leagues throughout the world, but how often do you hear about Americans/Europeans going there.
Yeah, I am familiar with the Brazilian system, but I hadn't heard of Joseense before. There is an article on the club in the English wikipedia that doesn't give a clue as to what league they are in, but the Portuguese wikipedia proved to be a little more helpful. If it makes you feel slightly better, most Yanks in Finland haven't played for the big clubs, they've generally played in the Ykkonen or Kakkonen (or even the fourth level). In general there are very few Yanks in South America. We've had a number of players make their way through Chile over the years, although I'm not sure if anyone is there currently (side note: is John Queeley still there? He was an unsigned Revs draft pick who played USL and then went to Iquique -- since been capped by the mighty St. Kitts & Nevis). Kyle Zenoni at La Paz FC in Bolivia, Bryan Lopez at Sportivo Luqueno in Paraguay. Youth in Argentina maybe? Hard to tell.
LOL! Pwned! Good for you buddy, those guys were acting like knobs... BTW, for a young kid to join up with a B1 team in the Paulista does not mean he'll play in obscurity. There were 5 Canadian kids that went on trial with an A3 team (Nacional SP) this spring that just happens to have it's training ground near that of Palmeiras, one of the Sao Paolo giants. A1 teams will check up on the lower league teams to scout any promising talent. Who knows, maybe he impresses somebody and gets a trial with a bigger club for next season.
We real Yanks Abroad posters and followers are always interested in Yank's playing soccer abroad. Even if its only for a college team in Singapore. I'd be interested in hearing about it. Always post.