Well? And how do they choose the names?
some (in the case of the brazilians) are nicknames, ie pele, garrincha- which means little bird- coming from their childhood.
the ‘inho’ bit at the back means junior, as in differentiating between ronaldo and ronaldinho (buck toothed flukey goal scoring bastards that they are), but this also makes no sense as in theres Roque junior in the current brazil team. as most of them have incredibly long 5 word names, it makes more sense to have a one word name upon the back of your top.
if i were rio ferdinand i’d campaign to just have ‘RIO’ on my top.
my brazil name would be TILLO
Pele
It’s a Brazilian thing, you wouldn’t understand.
according to onefootball.com ronaldinho was asked whether it was a fluke, he said he went for goal because he knew the goalie was off his line…
anyway, to answer the question… i don’t know when it started…but many people have nick names on the playing field as kids… the nickname gets famous as the player gets famous… sometimes he gets a nickname after he is famous… ronaldo is called the phenom.
Pele is the most famous of the nicknames. his real name is edson arantes do nascimento. it’s much easier to chant “Pele! Pele!” when he’s on the field… he got his nickname from friends in school who used to tease him with the name pele… the name stuck around…