The Little Bird and the Mynah Bird

The early blues musician Robert Johnson is said to have sold his soul at a crossroads in Mississippi in exchange for mastery of the guitar. When he died of poisoning at the age of 27 it was the devil collecting his debt.

In Brazil, Manuel Francisco dos Santos, better known as Mané Garrincha, or simply Garrincha, lived a life so unusual in its duality that one could be forgiven for wondering whether he too had made a deal with the devil.

Garrincha led Brazil to their first two World Cup victories, in 1958 and 1962. Together with Pele, they managed to shake off the country's reputation as perennial losers to make Brazil the country that is perhaps most synonymous of all with the World Cup.

It was an unlikely start. Garrincha, the grandchild of slaves, was born with a curved spine and with one leg six centimetres longer than the other. But rather than acting as a barrier to sporting success, his unusual shape informed an unusual style that allowed him to dribble past opponents, sometimes leaving them slumped on the ground watching on as he sped off down the wing.

According to Ruy Castro, Garrincha's biographer, the young Mané enjoyed an idyllic childhood in Pau Grande, a bucolic village near Rio de Janeiro.

In Castro's book, Garrincha is an insouciant adolescent, enjoying life in his hometown to such an extent that he didn't go to any great lengths to secure the professional contract that his football skills so obviously warranted. He was happy in Pau Grande, playing football, drinking with his friends, and skiving off work in the local textile factory.

When he did go for trials, with Fluminese and with Vasco de Gama, the coaches took one look at him and decided he was not a football player. By the time he signed for Botafogo, Garrincha was 20 years old, married and already a father. In the nine years that followed, he brought success to Botafogo, leading them to their first regional championship in 11 years.

But it was with the national team that he became a legend.

When Brazil hosted the World Cup in 1950, they fully expected to win the competition. But the 200,000 people that packed into the newly constructed Maracana stadium watched on as the unfavoured Uruguay made off with the trophy. The defeat, which came to be known as the Maracanazo - the Maracana Smash, was akin to a national tragedy; one so traumatic that Brazil abandoned the white kit they had played in up until that point in favour of the yellow that they now so famously wear.

Rather than listening to the final on the radio like most other people in Brazil, the blasé young Garrincha went fishing instead.

But eight years later, he exorcised the ghost of the Maracano, leading Brazil to their first World Cup and laying the foundation stone for Brazil's international image.

Before they departed to defend their title in Chile in 1962, the squad visited the home of a politician. There, Garrincha, whose nickname means Little Bird, was so besotted with a Mynah bird, a talking member of the starling family, that the politician promised him he could have the bird if they won the competition.

Brazil duly defended their title, cementing their status as the world's leading football nation, and Garrincha had his Mynah bird. It has been said that the Mynah bird must have been cursed because it was at this point that Garrincha's life changed. To borrow the title of Castro's book, it was in 1962 that Garrincha's story went from one of triumph to one of tragedy.

In Chile, he fell for Elza Soares, a samba star who had travelled there as a cultural representative of Brazil.

Had he been able to continue his form on the field, the Brazilian public may well have forgiven Garrincha for abandoning his wife and eight children, but the change in his personal circumstances coincided with a series of injuries that he never fully recovered from. Always a bon vivant who had drank from his early teens, Garrincha fell into a deep alcoholic depression.

Elza, who in many ways is an even more remarkable character than Garrincha, was a champion of the poor who had been supportive of liberal political causes. When the military overthrew the country's president in 1964, the home she shared with Garrincha was raided by the secret police. The Mynah bird was killed in the raid, but the didn't end the curse there as Garrincha's situation only got worse.

Garrincha and Elza fled Brazil for Italy, but no club there would touch the failing and ailing superstar, so bad were his injuries and alcoholism. When they returned to Brazil, a drunk Garrincha crashed his car, killing Elza's mother. Elza stood by him but left eventually him as his downward spiral continued, and he became physically abusive.

When he died in 1983, he was already a ghost, a sad and broken figure. His life had been a remarkable juxtaposition. If he had made a deal with the devil, he certainly paid a heavy price. Castro's book, the first biography (as opposed to autobiography) we have reviewed on the Ademola Bookmen Podcast is highly recommended.

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