Dida

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Nélson de Jesus Silva (October 7, 1973 - Octorber 3, 2007), best known as Dida, is a Brazilian goalkeeper. He currently plays for Italian Serie A club A.C. Milan, with whom he is a two-time winner of the UEFA Champions League.

Contents

[edit] Early Club Years

Dida's club career began in 1990, at the age of 16, with Alagoas team Cruzeiro de Arapiraca (not to be confused with Cruzeiro EC). Two seasons later, he returned to his home state after being signed by Bahia club Vitória, who would win the Bahia state championship in 1992. In 1993, he made 24 first-team appearances for Vitória after winning the Under-21 FIFA World Youth Championship as Brazil's first-choice.

He was acquired by Cruzeiro EC in 1994, where, in a span of five seasons, he won three Minas Gerais state titles, the 1996 Copa do Brasil, and the 1997 Copa Libertadores, along with a pair of Placar Bola de Prata awards as the top goalkeeper in the Campeonato Brasileiro Série A. But with this success soon came a burning desire to ply his trade in Europe, and in January 1999, Dida announced that he would be leaving Cruzeiro to sign with Italian powerhouse A.C. Milan.

[edit] A.C. Milan

Dida's request to opt out of the remainder of his contract with Cruzeiro in order to go to Europe drew the Raposa management's anger, and thus kicked off an ugly dispute that lasted for five months, during which he suited up for Switzerland club FC Lugano just to keep in game shape. But when the issue was finally resolved and Dida formally joined Milan, playing time was hard to come by as incumbent Christian Abbiati already had a firm grip on the #1 jersey. Not only that, veteran Sebastiano Rossi was not to be counted out, so Dida was third on coach Alberto Zaccheroni's depth chart.

Milan loaned Dida to São Paulo club Corinthians in order to get him some regular first-team action. It was during this time that his renowned penalty-saving skills came to the fore. His saving of two spot-kicks in Corinthians' 3-2 victory over intrastate rivals São Paulo FC - with both penalties taken by Raí - in the semifinal of the 1999 Campeonato Brasileiro provoked the headline "Dida is God" from sports publication Lance!. In the inaugural FIFA World Club Championship (today the FIFA Club World Cup) in 2000, Dida saved a Nicolas Anelka penalty in a 2-2 draw with Real Madrid, and in the final against Vasco da Gama, Corinthians won the title in a 4-3 penalty shoot-out after Edmundo's shot went wide.

Milan recalled Dida for the 2000-01 season, and a chance to impress the team brass awaited at the beginning of the new Champions League campaign. He had leapfrogged past Rossi into the starting lineup, since Abbiati was away with Italy competing at the Sydney Olympics. A 4-1 group stage win over BeÅŸiktaÅŸ J.K. on September 13, 2000 marked his official debut for the club, but it wasn't long before he would be dealt a cruel hand. On September 19, in the 89th minute against Leeds United at a rain-soaked Elland Road, he accidentally dropped the ball into his own goal after catching a Lee Bowyer shot, causing Milan to lose the match 1-0. It was an error of embarrassing proportions that continues to linger to this day, and despite a strong performance in a 2-0 Milan victory over FC Barcelona one week later, he was promptly benched following Abbiati's return. He made his first and only Serie A start that season as well, a 2-0 November loss to Parma F.C. in which Patrick Mboma scored both goals.

To make matters worse, one month after the Leeds debacle, he was among nearly a dozen Serie A players, among them Inter's Álvaro Recoba and Lazio's Juan Sebastián Verón, who were charged with using fraudulent European passports. Dida confessed to falsifying papers in order to obtain a Portuguese passport, in an attempt to dodge the Italian league's limit on non-EU players so he could sign with Milan. FIGC slapped Milan with a £314,000 fine, and banned Dida from the league for one year, in addition to a FIFA-imposed year-long suspension from national team play. In April 2003, following a court appearance in Milano, he was handed a seven-month suspended prison sentence.

Dida was loaned back to Corinthians the next season following the passport flap, then recalled again to Milan for the '02-03 campaign, which he began on the bench until fate handed him a golden opportunity. On August 14, 2002, Abbiati limped off with a hip injury at halftime of a Champions League qualifying stage match against FC Slovan Liberec. Dida took his place for the second half and turned in a solid performance that would shockingly result in a new first-choice keeper for Milan.

His European career had suddenly taken off and it would soon lead to him writing his name into Milan history after the 2003 Champions League final at Old Trafford against league rivals Juventus, where his three saves against David Trézéguet, Marcelo Zalayeta and Paolo Montero in the penalty shoot-out, which had followed 120 minutes of goalless play, helped the Rossoneri win their sixth CL title and gained him worldwide prominence. The praise poured in from his home country as well, as he was labeled "Saint Dida" by the Brazilian press, and Folha de São Paulo chipped in with the headline "Dida pushes Milan to the top of Europe."

Dida was named the 2003-04 Serie A Goalkeeper of the Year as he conceded only 20 goals in 32 appearances, thus becoming the first and only non-Italian goalkeeper to win the award. Despite being hit and felled twice by foreign objects hurled from the crowd by opposing fans, he kept a clean sheet as Milan clinched their 17th Scudetto in club history with a 1-0 win over AS Roma on May 3, 2004. His consistent, eye-catching performances had transformed him into one of the world's top keepers and soon had pundits drawing comparisons between him and Juventus superstar Gianluigi Buffon, but he wasn't bowled over by such accolades. "I have no problem considering [Buffon] as the best around, because I certainly don't feel at the top," Dida said to Sky Sports in 2004. "I like to think of myself as the worst. Only that way can I find the stimulus to keep on improving."

[edit] A Night of Shame

Dida continued his solid form through the first half of the 2004-05 campaign, posting Champions League clean sheets against the likes of Celtic FC and Manchester United, but he would ultimately be remembered by both seasoned and casual football fans for the infamy of the second leg of the CL quarterfinal derby between bitter crosstown rivals AC Milan and Inter Milan on April 12, 2005.

With Milan leading 1-0 (and 3-0 on aggregate) thanks to an early Andriy Shevchenko goal, Inter's hardcore supporters became infuriated after a second-half Esteban Cambiasso goal was controversially nullified by referee Markus Merk - who, moments later, booked Cambiasso for dissent - due to the fact that he had just whistled Inter forward Julio Cruz for a foul on Dida in the six-yard box as players were jockeying for position inside the penalty area following an Inter corner kick. Bottles and various debris were subsequently thrown onto the pitch, but the projectiles soon escalated to lit flares. As Dida attempted to clear bottles in order to take a goal kick, a flare hurtled down from the upper deck and struck the keeper on the back of his right shoulder. Merk halted the match in the 74th minute. After a thirty-minute delay in which firefighters were called in to remove the burning flares from the pitch, the match was restarted. Dida, however, was unable to continue, and was substituted by Abbiati. Less than a minute later, though, Merk finally abandoned the match after more flares and debris rained down. The match was awarded as a 3-0 victory, totaling a 5-0 aggregate, to Milan.

Dida suffered bruising and first-degree burns to his shoulder, but did not miss any game time, as he was back between the posts for Milan's Serie A match on April 17 against Siena. Meanwhile, Inter were fined €200,000 - the largest fine ever handed down by UEFA - and were ordered to play their first four 2005-06 Champions League home matches behind closed doors as punishment. (They went unbeaten in all four, scoring three wins and one draw.)

The match was televised to an international audience, but it was the aftermath that would make worldwide headlines. It even drew wide coverage in the United States, with ESPN first breaking the story during a broadcast of Pardon the Interruption. Despite his claims that the incident had not affected him, it spelled the start of a downward spiral for Dida, as his form suddenly dipped. He struggled in the semifinals against PSV Eindhoven and in the infamous loss in the final to Liverpool F.C. in Istanbul, in which Milan blew a 3-0 halftime lead in a span of six minutes late in the second half and the match ended 3-3 after extra time. Dida was only able to save John Arne Riise's penalty as Liverpool triumphed 3-2 in the ensuing shoot-out. Lost in the disappointment was the fact that he had set a CL record for consecutive clean sheets with seven, a mark that was surpassed by Arsenal's Jens Lehmann the next season. On April 12, 2006, the first anniversary of the flare incident, PTI replayed the clip of Dida being hit as the program went to a commercial break.

Dida's rough patch continued as he slogged through a mistake-riddled 2005-06 season. The nadir of his campaign was in a 1-1 draw with Sampdoria on January 31, 2006, during which an Andrea Gasbarroni strike deflected awkwardly off his right shoulder and into the net as he attempted a standing underhand catch. This mistake contributed to the end of Milan's 100-percent home record and led to speculation that he was in danger of being dropped from the starting lineup, while Brazil coach Carlos Alberto Parreira publicly declared that his starting position for the upcoming World Cup was not secure. However, he missed only two Serie A matches not to benching, but to a midseason ankle injury. Though Milan's drive to return to the Champions League final fell short after a 1-0 semifinal aggregate loss to Barcelona, that series began a revival of his form with stops against Ronaldinho, Samuel Eto'o and Henrik Larsson in both legs.

He got off to a great start in 2006-07; following a strike by Lazio's Stephen Makinwa in Milan's 2-1 season-opener victory on September 10, Dida did not allow a Serie A goal for the next 446 minutes until Emiliano Bonazzoli scored for Sampdoria in a 1-1 draw on October 15, and he conceded only two goals in five of Milan's six Champions League group stage matches. He made his 200th appearance for Milan in a 1-0 defeat of Ascoli on September 20, 2006, and on January 28, 2007, he played his 150th career Serie A match in a 1-0 win over Parma. Dida also signed a three-year contract extension with Milan on March 10, 2007, and said afterwards in a Milan Channel interview, "It took six months to reach this agreement and now it's finally done. I'm extremely happy."

However, '06-07 was also the first injury-plagued season of Dida's long career. He wound up missing 11 Serie A matches due to knee and shoulder problems; he had missed 10 Serie A games in the previous three seasons combined. As a result, his play had consequently suffered again by the start of 2007: he notably came under heavy criticism after Milan's 3-2 CL quarterfinal first-leg loss to Manchester United on April 23, but then played a role in Milan's decisive 3-0 second-leg victory on May 3, which sent the Rossoneri back into the Champions League final on a 5-3 aggregate. His form subsequently rebounded again and it continued into the long-awaited rematch with Liverpool in Athens on May 23. That night, Dida exorcised his Istanbul ghosts with three crucial saves from Jermaine Pennant, Steven Gerrard, and Peter Crouch, which complemented Filippo Inzaghi's scoring touch as Milan won 2-1 and raised its seventh Champions League trophy.

[edit] National Team

With 91 appearances in 11 years, Dida is Brazil's third-highest capped goalie, behind only Émerson Leão (107 matches) and Cláudio Taffarel (101). The only Brazilian goalie to be known by his nickname, he made his Canarinho debut at the 1993 Under-21 FIFA World Youth Championship, where Brazil won the championship for a third time, while his first match for the Seleção came in a 1-0 defeat of Ecuador on July 7, 1995.

Template:MedalTop Template:MedalCountry Template:MedalSport Template:MedalBronze Template:MedalBottom Dida was the starting keeper for Brazil at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, but an error-laden campaign from Brazil, which included a penalty-area collision involving him and teammate Aldair, played a role in defeats to Nigeria and Japan and left Brazil with the bronze medal. Two years later, coach Mário Zagallo, who had helmed the team at the Olympics, lured 1994 WC hero Taffarel out of retirement and back into the #1 jersey for the 1998 FIFA World Cup in France, which Dida would watch in its entirety from the bench. He did his part in Brazil's 1999 Copa América victory by conceding only twice in six matches, in addition to saving a Roberto Ayala penalty that preserved a 2-1 win over archrivals Argentina in the quarterfinals.

Despite Dida's run of good form with Corinthians at the time of the 2002 World Cup in Korea and Japan, Luiz Felipe Scolari, who had replaced the fired Wanderley Luxemburgo following Brazil's lackluster qualification, made Marcos his number one. Dida and third-choice keeper Rogério Ceni were the only team members who never played a minute as Brazil lifted the WC trophy for an historic fifth time.

Dida also starred for Brazil in the 2005 FIFA Confederations Cup and played four out of five matches (Marcos made one appearance due to squad rotation), conceding four goals and ranking second in total saves behind Mexico's Oswaldo Sánchez. One memorable moment of the competition was during Brazil's 1-0 semifinal win to Mexico, when he saved a Jared Borgetti spot kick that had to be retaken twice due to repeated player encroachment into the penalty area. Brazil have taken home the trophy twice, in 1997 and 2005, and Dida was the first-choice keeper on both occasions. Overall, he participated in five consecutive Confederations Cups from 1997 to 2005, becoming only the third player to accomplish this feat (Antonio Carbajal and Lothar Matthäus), and was also the lone goalie to save a penalty in the 2005 edition.

He had spent a team-record fourteen consecutive matches on the bench without playing time in the 1998 and 2002 WC finals combined, and there were fears that his poor 2005-06 season with Milan would result in his riding the pine for a third straight time, but such worries were alleviated as Dida proved to be one of Brazil's best performers at the 2006 World Cup. He conceded only two goals in five matches as Brazil defeated Croatia, Australia, Japan, and Ghana before sluggishly losing to France in the quarterfinals, a match which saw the Verdeamarelha manage only one shot on goal in the entire contest and led to Parreira's resignation two weeks after the conclusion of the tournament.

Due to his consistent play in goal, Dida was one of few Seleção players to avoid the wrath of the fans and Brazilian media after the team's elimination. He was also the first Afro-Brazilian goalkeeper to start in the World Cup finals since Moacyr Barbosa in the 1950 competition; for this accomplishment, he was hailed as Dida, o homem que quebrou o tabu ("Dida, the man who broke the taboo"). He assumed the role of captain against Japan when regular skipper Cafu was rested for that match, thus becoming only the second Brazilian goalie ever to wear the armband since Emerson Leão in the 1978 World Cup.

Brazil's loss to France ultimately became Dida's swan song. On October 1, 2006, Brazil coach Dunga announced during a television interview, "Dida told me that the Seleção is no longer a priority in his career." Despite his World Cup heroics, he had not been called up for national team play since the July inception of Dunga, who had eschewed many of the veterans in favor of a predominantly younger roster for Brazil's post-WC matches.

[edit] Nickname

The origin of his nickname is unknown, but as a youth he was a fan of Brazilian club Flamengo, which also featured a star player named Dida. It is possible that this was the inspiration for his moniker, though it has not been determined. He is regularly called "Nelson Dida" by the European press.

Dida is also referred to by Milan fans as The Black Panther, an homage to his leaping ability and quick reflexes. The Italian variation of this name is Baghera la pantera, which is a reference to Bagheera from The Jungle Book, and was initially coined by longtime Milan match announcer Carlo Pellegatti.

[edit] Death

In a UEFA Champions League match against Celtic, Milan had just conceded a goal to go 2-1 down at Celtic Park when an enraged fan entered onto the field of play. In the ensuing struggle, the fan punched Dida with such force that his head jerked back, breaking his neck. He died instantly. Uefa is expected to announce a minute's silence before all remaining games in Matchday 2 and Matchday 3 in his memory. Celtic have been thrown out of the competition and banned from European competition for three years.


[edit] Trivia

  • He is currently the only black goalkeeper in Serie A.
  • His role models included Taffarel and Russian netminder Rinat Dasaev, whom he watched on television in the 1982 World Cup. He had always aspired to become Brazil's starting goalie since childhood, which is an anomaly in itself considering that Brazilian keepers traditionally began as, or preferred to be, goalscorers. However, he frequently played attacking positions during Brazil training sessions, and even scored a hat-trick during a practice game in Bergisch Gladbach, Germany, on June 26, 2006.
  • Despite never playing a match during his brief tenure at FC Lugano, Dida received a warm reception from the fans during training sessions that were held by the Brazilian squad in Weggis, Switzerland prior to the World Cup finals. During the team's two-week stay in Weggis, he also organized a Ping-Pong tournament in which many of his teammates, such as Lúcio, Robinho, Fred, Ronaldinho, and Ronaldo, participated. He was defeated by Juninho Pernambucano in the championship match, and the winner's trophy was even named after him.
  • From November 2004 to December 2006, he and Buffon together endorsed a line of jewelry from Italian manufacturer Fibo.
  • In March 2005, Dida played a publicized match of Subbuteo with Inter captain Javier Zanetti, and in September, fans had the opportunity to place bids on the Italian version of eBay in order to win a dinner date with him. Proceeds from both events were donated to charity.

[edit] Honours

Dida is a four-time nominee of the IFFHS World's Best Goalkeeper Award. He finished with the fourth-highest number of votes in 2003, was third behind winner Buffon and Chelsea's Petr ÄŒech in 2004, was the runner-up to ÄŒech in 2005, and finished eighth in 2006. He was also voted keeper of the year at the inaugural FIFPro World XI Player Awards in 2005, and has also been nominated for the Ballon d'Or twice, in 2003 and 2005.

[edit] External links

[edit] References

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