When Carlos Alberto Pintinho was born in the mid-1950s, Brazil had not won a single World Cup, losing in their sole trip in 1950, whilst they had won just three Copa América titles in 1919, 1922, and 1949. By the time he was 16, he had seen his national team win three World Cups. Little did he know it, but he’d soon be playing for the Canarinha on the biggest stage in South America. Born and raised by his grandparents in the favela of Morro do Borel, Pintinho enjoyed a privileged upbringing thanks to his grandfather’s job at the Souza Cruz cigarette factory and went to private school, balancing his academic progress with his footballing ambitions.
He started off playing ‘pelada’ on the streets and dirt fields of his favela, before eventually signing for the factory team of his grandfather at the futsal level. After a brief spell with América, where he transitioned from futsal to field football, Pintinho returned to his barefoot battles after América closed its youth academy before making the move to Fluminense’s academy. At the age of 12 years old, Pintinho was going to be leaving his family and trading his favelas for the glitzy neighborhood of Urca.
“The favelas have changed a lot, but the truth is, I never had any issues living there – I had a beautiful childhood there. I left home at an early age and started playing for Fluminense, and I’d only go back on Saturday if I was playing at home rather than away,” stated Pintinho in an exclusive Get Spanish Football News interview. “I then started playing for the first team and soon started traveling to other countries. It’s been 45 years since I moved to Spain, but I always go back to Brazil twice a year to be with my family, and I’m going this month.”
“I’ve never lived with my parents, and my grandparents and mother are no longer alive, but I’m going back to see my father, my sisters, my cousins, all the people I lived with when I was little, so I will have direct contact with them when I go there. I had a great childhood with my cousins and my siblings, and we still get along very well today. We have a very beautiful relationship with my family and a family harmony that I will never give up, and so I’m very excited to see them…and to have some feijoada.”
Pintinho enjoyed a breakthrough 1972 that saw him make his first-team debut at the age of 17 before excelling at the international level by guiding Brazil to victory against Argentina in the Tournoi Juniors U-18 de Cannes in France before competing in Brazil’s last-placed finish in the Summer Olympics in 1972. He parlayed this into a stellar decade which saw him impose himself in the line-up at the expense of captain Denílson and emerge as one of the top defensive midfielders in the Brazilian top-flight. Similar to the likes of Thomas Grønnemark and Kellyn Acosta, Pintinho combined a measured passing volume with an aggressive approach to regaining possession, helping Fluminense win the 1973 and 1975 Campeonato Carioca and the 1973 Torneio Internacional de Verão do Rio de Janeiro. Tasked with marking the opposing team’s #10 – including a certain Pelé – Pintinho stood out thanks to his superb tackling and impressive anticipation.
It’s these stellar performances that elevated him to the Brazilian national team, with Pintinho making 3 appearances between 1977 and 1979, including one in the Copa América. He would end up departing Fluminense after a legendary chapter that saw him win 9 major titles, making the move across Rio de Janeiro and enjoying a fleeting spell at Vasco da Gama, before leaving Rio for the fist time and joining Spanish outfit Sevilla. Fast-forward nearly a quarter-century, and he hasn’t left the Andalusian city. Pintinho went from a hard-nosed defensive midfielder in Fluminense to an eloquent, tactically adept #10 to Sevilla; having scored 23 goals in 381 appearances for Fluminense, Pintinho would end up scoring 25 goals in 102 appearances for Sevilla. But when one of the candidates for the upcoming Sevilla presidential elections pressured manager Manolo Cardo to remove Pintinho from the first team, Pintinho returned to Fluminense for a six-month spell before heading to Andalusian side Cádiz, followed by a swan song at Portuguese side Farense.
“My time in Portugal was nice because Faro is a very beautiful city. The truth is, I was practically already quitting football – it was more of a farewell than anything. “I lived in Faro, but on weekends I would come back to Seville, just like when I was at Cádiz. It was a very nice farewell to the world of football, because I no longer had the level that I once did. I was getting older and didn’t have the pleasure of playing like I used to, but I lived in a city I liked. It wasn’t a big team like Fluminense and Sevilla, but it wasn’t a weak team either. I liked it because it was a city that was similar to my Rio de Janeiro. I’ve been in Sevilla for 45 years, but we don’t have a beach here, so it was a good opportunity to spend a year away from Sevilla and get to the beach. I briefly lived outside of Sevilla and coached a team from Murcia; it was nice to coach a first-team squad, and it was a beautiful moment to develop my coaching career. But the truth is that I was very, very, very far from Seville, so I went back to Sevilla in order to relax and enjoy life, and I’ve been enjoying myself for a while now.”
Similarly to the likes of Glenn Davis, Pintinho transitioned from playing to youth coaching, whilst he also enjoyed success as the proprietor of his own clothing store, before retiring in 2020. And although he hasn’t played football for quite a few years due to hip surgery, he still finds the time to watch football matches and chat about the beautiful game with his two sons – one covers Sevilla for a local journal, the other lives in Madrid as the youngest FIFA-licensed agent in Spain.
“I like to get up early and do exercise. I often have issues staying up late to watch matches, but today, I’m going to watch Flamengo-Fluminense at 1:30 a.m. Sometimes I’ll watch Sevilla play, but I usually won’t watch the whole match because I’m not convinced by the way they play. I leave angry because I don’t like their style, so I prefer not to go. I’m staying in the middle of the city, and I’d rather not go to the stadium to watch them play live – I’d be wasting my time. I’d rather be watching it at home or at a bar, drinking beer with my friends.”
