How Vasco Da Gama fought for equality in early Brazilian football

Football was established relatively late in Brazil. When Charles Miller set up the footballing branch of the São Paulo Athletic Club in 1894, football had already had a two-decade head-start in neighbouring Argentina and Uruguay. 

Football remained the game of the elites, despite the foundation of working-class clubs in the early 20^thcentury. For example, Bangu Athletic Club near Rio de Janeiro, formed by British factory managers for their employees in 1904, or Corinthians Paulista in São Paulo, formed by railway workers in 1910 following the visit of English amateur touring side, Corinthian FC. Bangu had become the first team in Rio de Janeiro to field black and dual-heritage players, although they still faced discrimination.

Arthur Friedenreich, the son of a black Brazilian mother and German father, was part of the first Brazilian national side that played against English side Exeter City in 1914. In his book Football in Sun and Shadow, Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano credits Friedenreich with inventing what we know now as the Brazilian style of play. Friedenreich’s contemporary Carlos Alberto at Fluminense even covered his face with white powder in a game against América to disguise his origins. It sweated out in the carioca heat and gained the club its derogatory nickname pó de arroz (rice powder). 

In contrast, Uruguay had embraced and promoted its black players right from the start, with Isabelino Gradín and Juan Delgado key figures in La Celeste’s victory in the first South American Championship in 1916. The Chilean delegation had apparently grumbled after their defeat to Uruguay that La Celeste had “Africans” in its line-up. In neighbouring Brazil, progress took decades.

Vasco Da Gama’s ‘Historical Response’

Brazil had been the last country in the Americas to abolish slavery – as late as 1888. Going into the 1920s, elitism and racism were still rife in Brazilian football, much as they were in wider society. 

Football leagues in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro were flourishing, with many familiar names now established. One of them – Clube de Regatas Vasco Da Gama – was founded in 1898 as a sailing club, and named after the Portuguese explorer. Football was not added to the club’s roster until 1915.

In 1923, Vasco Da Gama – a club that prided itself on fielding black, mixed heritage and working-class players – won the Campeonato Carioca, run by the Liga Metropolitan de Desportos Terrestres (Metropolitan Terrestrial Sports League – LMTD) with its diverse team. A year later, the club faced pressure from the league’s major clubs to ban twelve of its players, deemed ‘unsuitable’ for a new elitist league on account of their background. 

Vasco refused. 

So, the other ‘aristocratic’ clubs broke away to create their own association, the Associação Metropolitan de Esportes Athleticos (Metropolitan Athletic Sports Association – AMEA). They then barred Vasco from joining unless the club fulfilled their criteria.

Vasco’s Portuguese president, Dr. José Augusto Prestes, issued his ‘historical response’ in reaction, in which he expresses his unwillingness to “sacrifice” the twelve players that helped Vasco win the championship.

Vasco’s exclusion meant it had to play against Rio’s smaller teams left in the LMTD for a year, such as Bonsucesso and Villa Isabel, who also failed to meet the demands of Rio’s elite clubs. In 1925, Vasco reached an agreement with the new association to compete again with the elite. 

The event was a watershed moment in Brazilian football history and opened the door a little wider for black players, such as Leônidas da Silva. Leônidas would be credited with inventing the bicycle kick and star for Brazil at the 1934 and 1938 World Cups. In April 2021, to mark the 97th anniversary of the Historical Response, Vasco launched a special all-black kit. The club is also helping to raise funds for a mural that celebrates Vasco black goalkeeper Barbosa, who was made a scapegoat for Brazil’s Maracanaço – its 1950 World Cup defeat to Uruguay.

If you’re interested in the roots of football in Brazil and elsewhere in the world, check out my book Origin Stories: The Pioneers Who Took Football to the World.