Leonidas played against the great Torino team that toured Brazil in 1948, a year before the tragedy that would kill them. Leonidas got into a fight and was sent off in the friendly match. About the trip The match: https://web.archive.org/web/2025043...rino-que-morreria-tragicamente-estreava-em-sp https://www.rsssf.org/tablest/torino-braztrip48.html [Jul 28, Wed] [at Pacaembú] SÃO PAULO FC 2-2 TORINO FC [Ponce de Leon 15, Lelé 57p] [G.Gabetto 11, R.Menti 33] MARIO BACIGALUPO, Valerio - - SAVERIO BALLARIN, Aldo MAURO TOMÀ, Sauro - - RUI GREZAR, Giuseppe BAUER RIGAMONTI, Mario <ROSETTA, Francesco> NORONHA MARTELLI, Danilo - - ANTONINHO MENTI, Romeo PONCE DE LEON <LELÉ> CASTIGLIANO, Eusebio <PIANI, Dante> LEÓNIDAS GABETTO, Guglielmo REMO MAZZOLA, Valentino TEIXEIRINHA OSSOLA, Franco Coach: FEOLA, Vicente Coach: SPERONE, Mario Referee: GARDELLI, Mario Sent off: Leónidas; V.Bacigalupo
Leonidas' first two professional seasons were missing. Brazilian football was professionalised in 1933. Obviously, the players were paid informally. Leonidas went to Uruguay to play for Penarol in 1933. In 1934, he returned to Vasco at the age of 21. He was a champion, but played only a few games. He moved to Botafogo in 1935, where he won the championship again, this time with great acclaim. He then moved to Flamengo. Carioca 1934 21 years old 3 matches, 0 goals, 0 assist, 0 sent off, 1ºplace Carioca 1935 16 matches, 6 goals (3 headers, 0 fk, 0 pk), 4 assist, 0.62 g+a, 0 sent off, 1º place
Nadav Yaacobi once segued into a longer piece about him by mentioning his former editor considered him the greatest player he'd seen, or a similar epithet, somewhere in the mid-Nineties. (The editor was probably Noah Klieger, and it was probably based on one or both world cups.) Ordinarily, that would be most random bit of trivia I know, but as both were Ballon d'Or voters, I thought you might be vaguely interested.
Out of 296 possible games (only counting the domestic league, excluding friendlies), Leonidas played 223. He was available in only 75% of the games. Leonidas only played in all the matches in the 1940 Carioca and the 1949 Paulita. And then there were the three sending-offs in 87 games for Flamengo (at São Paulo I forgot to count, I think there were two or three sent-offs) and the season 1941 when he was suspended for the entire year. Also Leonidas missed four Copa America (1941, 1942, 1945 and 1946) and the semi-final of the 1938 world cup. So availability was a problem for Leonidas. On the other hand, in 15 seasons, Leonidas won 8 domestic league titles by four different teams. In Botafogo's first title he played very little, but in the others he was either the best player or a key player. So he was a winner. Leonidas' signature move was the bicycle kick (chilena). Biographers claim that Leonidas made 14 bicycle goals, but that includes friendlies. The difficult thing about registering a bicycle kick goal is that some sources consider a move to be a bicycle kick and others do not. And there's confusion between bicycle goals and others scissor kicks (goles de chilena vs goles de tijera). Without video it's difficult. Yes, definitely, if you could share it with the forum, it would be great
Leonidas da Silva's last official tournament: The 1950 Rio São Paulo 4 matches, 1 goal, 0 assist, 1 sent off
Leonidas' disciplinary historic Flamengo 3 sent off São Paulo 2 sent offs At the time there were no yellow cards, so the player wasn't suspended for accumulating penalties. 5 sent-offs in 227 games. A sending off every 45 games. It's not Sergio Ramos who has 30 reds in 700 games (+-25 games), but it's still shows that he was a temperamental player
An anecdote in 1965, when Leonidas was already retired and was considered a grumpy old man "A fan approached Leonidas and asked for an autograph. Leonidas looked him up and down and said ‘No’. The fan asked: ‘but you're not Leonidas?’. "Yes, I am. ‘Then...’ "Look, mate, I'm not signing anything. Pelé charges 2,000 cruzeiros to sign anything, I'm poorer than him..".