Since 2008, Manchester United and Desportivo Brasil have enjoyed a mutual exchange where players, coaches and football knowledge have traveled between the two sides.
Desportivo Brasil was founded in 2005 by the Traffic Group, a vast sporting company in Brazil, with the sole purpose of utilizing the club to send players abroad to greener -- in terms of pitch and pound -- pastures. Desportivo's multi-million pound training centre is one of the finest in all of South America. In this new age of football, the first-rate facilities are not utilized for trophy acquisition but for financial gains.
Desportivo's location in Porto Feliz, only 90 minutes ride to Sao Paulo, is critical to the club's vision of moving players to Europe for financial gain. Sao Paulo is the largest city in South America, in terms of population. The mega-city boasts a modern airport with frequent incoming flights completed by American Airlines, Air Canada, Delta, Iberia, Lufthansa, British Airways and Air France.
The proximity lends to cheaper costs when players are sent out on trial to clubs on the European continent or to North America.
Manchester United gained a foothold early at Desportivo and the relationships remains strong today.
In March of 2012, the Old Trafford machine added 17-year-old midfielder Lucas Evangelista. The teenager, capable of playing in an attacking or defensive role, impressed the United scouting machine with his work-rate and dribbling skills. In 2013, he will sign a professional contract after his 18th birthday joining Anderson, Rafael and Fabio da Silva as Brazilian Reds.
In yet another savvy move United is utilizing FC Twente to essentially host the Brazilian wunderkinds until the Samba stars-in-training can gain valuable first-team experience and more importantly the credentials needed for EU status.
In the past, Traffic's president of international business Jochen Losch noted the relationship between United and Twente.
Losch stated to Sportsmail:
"Twente are a partner, helping United to resolve the problem of their EU passports. For two reasons it's good that a player goes first to Holland. First, after two or three years he's considered to be European. And of course it's easier to play in the Dutch league than the Premier League."
If the player succeeds in Europe, Desportivo and its owner Traffic succeed as well. For example, United pays a fee to Traffic for players such as Evangelista. The Brazilian company then retains a fifty-percent share of any future profits from the sale of the player.
In addition to Evangelista, striker Aguilar and midfielder Agnaldo are two more Desportivo prodigies who could prove critical to future United title teams. And now comes word this December that United will add yet another Desportivo youngster when Bruno Gomes joins United in 2014.
So in a full-circle kind of way, Desportivo is about trophy acquisition after all.
Source notes
Links via TribalFootball.com and FiestaFootball.com
Information sources: Manchester Evening News and Man Utd's Brazil Project
Photo via Hanumann at Flickr's Creative Commons
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