Latest news with #GondomarFC
Boston Globe
a day ago
- Sport
- Boston Globe
Liverpool and Portugal players join family in mourning Diogo Jota and his brother at funeral
Advertisement Neves and João Cancelo attended the funeral after playing in Orlando on Friday, when their Al Hilal was eliminated by Fluminense. Both players had wept when a minute of silence was held before the quarterfinal match. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up The service was held at Igreja Matriz church in the Portuguese town of Gondomar, where Jota had a home. Church bells pealed at 10:00 a.m. local time as the funeral started. Pallbearers carried the caskets of both brothers from a chapel next door and into the church. Relatives and hundreds of friends and acquaintances, including players of the local Gondomar FC where Jota started playing at age 9, then followed. Portugal's national team coach Roberto Martínez and several other top Portuguese players also attended, including Manchester City duo Bernardo Silva and Rúben Dias and Manchester United's Bruno Fernándes. Advertisement 'These are really, really sad days, as you can imagine,' Martínez said. 'But today we showed we are a large, close family. ... Their spirit will be with us forever.' The bishop of Porto, Manuel Linda, led the funeral mass. The church was filled to capacity and a couple of dozen people followed the service via loudspeaker from outside. Afterwards, the coffins were carried to the cemetery next to the church. Jota, 28, and the 25-year-old Silva were found dead near Zamora in northwestern Spain early Thursday after the Lamborghini they were driving crashed on an isolated stretch of highway just after midnight and burst into flames. Brothers killed in car crash The brothers were reportedly heading to catch a boat from northern Spain to go to England where Jota was to rejoin with Liverpool after a summer break. Spanish police are investigating the cause of the crash, which did not involve another vehicle, they said. They said they believe it could have been caused by a blown tire. Their bodies were repatriated to Portugal after being identified by the family. A wake was held for them on Friday. Jota's death occurred two weeks after he married long-time partner Rute Cardoso while on vacation from a long season where he helped Liverpool win the Premier League. The couple had three children, the youngest born last year. Their loss led to an outpouring of condolences from the soccer world and Portuguese officials. Wilson reported from Barcelona, Spain.
Euronews
a day ago
- Sport
- Euronews
Thousands gather to bid farewell to Diogo Jota, André Silva at funeral
Thousands of people gathered on Sunday morning in the church of Gondomar, a municipality east of the Porto metropolitan area, for the funeral of Liverpool player Diogo Jota and brother André Silva, who died in a car crash in Spain on Thursday. The bishop of Porto, Manuel Linda, presided over the funeral mass. The church was completely full and a few dozen people followed the ceremony through loudspeakers outside. The coffins were then transported to the cemetery next to the church. The urns of the two players were carried by friends and players from Gondomar FC, the club where Diogo Jota launched his football career at the age of 9. André Silva also started playing football at the same club before transferring to FC Porto's youth academy. The procession on foot to the cemetery was accompanied by thousands of fans who, from a distance, wanted to pay their last respects to the two local players. The Liverpool Football Club squad attended the ceremonies on Saturday, led by their captain Virgil Van Dijk, who arrived with a red floral arrangement in the shape of a football shirt with Diogo Jota's number 20 embossed in white. Liverpool teammate Andrew Robertson carried a similar arrangement with the number 30, the number worn by Silva, who played for FC Penafiel in Portugal's second division. Portugal's national team coach Roberto Martínez and several top Portuguese players were also present, including Bernardo Silva and Rúben Dias from Manchester City and Manchester United captain Bruno Fernandes. "These are very sad days, today was a reminder that we are a family, we are together and we are Portugal. Now we have to say thank you for all the messages from all over the world. We're with André Silva and Diogo Jota, always," Portugal's national coach told journalists after the funeral of the two players. Jota's national side captain and football superstar, Cristiano Ronaldo, was however notably absent. British media outlet – The Mirror – says the Portuguese star opted to skip the funeral as to not detract from the sombre proceedings. A few days ago, Ronaldo took to his social media to share an emotional tribute to Jota. Diogo, 28, and André, 25, were found dead near Zamora, in northwestern Spain, in the early hours of Thursday morning, after the Lamborghini they were driving crashed on an isolated stretch of the A-52 highway shortly after midnight on Thursday and burst into flames. The brothers were on their way to Santander, northern Spain, to catch a ferry to the United Kingdom, where Jota was due to return to Liverpool after the summer break to prepare for the new season. Spanish officials say a tire on Jota's car blew out as he attempted to overtake another vehicle. Police are still investigating the incident. The bodies were repatriated to Portugal after being identified by the family. A wake was held for the two players on Friday. Jota's death came two weeks after he married his long-term partner, Rute Cardoso, while on holiday after a long successful season in which he helped Liverpool win their 20th Premier League and Portugal win their second UEFA Nations League title last month. The couple had three children together with the youngest born last year. The shocking death of the Liverpool striker sparked an outpouring of condolences from across the world of sport, entertainment and politics.
BBC News
3 days ago
- Sport
- BBC News
'A symbol of hope & inspiration - Jota was a Portuguese hero'
"It's not about where we come from, but where we're going to."The sentence can be found at the entrance of the Gondomar FC academy followed by a picture of its illustrious son Diogo Jota wearing the colours of the club he played for between the ages of nine and 17. Right next to it, there's another one of him with the Portugal national team shirt how far Jota 2022, it has been renamed as the Diogo Jota words, said by the forward himself after scoring twice in a 3-0 win against Sweden in the Nations League in 2020, illustrate exactly who he 28-year-old, who died along with his brother Andre Silva on Thursday following a car accident in Spain, spent almost all his formative years in his hometown with a third-tier team, paying around 20 euros each month to play for them while being overlooked by the big sides because of his the odds, he never gave up. He kept believing and went from Gondomar to Pacos de Ferreira, then to Porto, Wolverhampton and finally became a symbol of hope and inspiration back home. He proved to an entire country that it's possible to reach the top even if the path isn't a straight talent had always been much so that in his early days, when he was starting to draw some attention with Pacos, one of his former coaches, Jorge Simao, made a big claim by saying Jota would be Cristiano Ronaldo's player was obviously surprised to hear that, but immediately thought to himself, 'If he believes in that, why can't I do that?'Jota was a rare case of an elite Portuguese footballer who never spent time at any of the big three academies - Benfica, Sporting and Porto."What set him apart from everyone else was really the mental aspect, the way he overcame any situation - and he realised that very quickly," former Pacos' youth football coordinator Gilberto Andrade told BBC Sport."I think there are moments when, whether you're a coach, a coordinator, or a director, there are words, things said, that have a great impact on players. At the time, perhaps they don't fully understand it, but later it reflects in their behaviour, in how they train, in how they live day to day."And Jota, I think, to some extent with us, understood what it meant to be a professional player, what it meant to be a good athlete, a good person. He was an example in that regard. An example, because often success leads many players to have a somewhat winding path due to the money they make."But that wasn't the case with him. He was always very disciplined, very intelligent, very humble. He invested wisely, knew what he was doing, helped those he could. So I think this is the image that must remain of him." Jota took the long road, but always had it clear where he was became obvious to Andrade the day he came to him with an unusual request. "I want to learn a foreign language. Someday, I might play abroad and I've got to be ready," said Gondomar boy was still young but had spent long enough outside the radar of the Portuguese powerhouses to realise his future could be far away from his home country."He knew very well where he was going," recalled Andrade, who has also worked in Italy, Belgium and Saudi Arabia."Back then, I had those audio language courses, so I handed some of them to him. Soon, however, he realised they weren't enough - he actually needed a teacher. For him, it was evident that he was going to need it later in his career. He was this different." For a brief moment, Jota feared his career would be at risk following a heart problem diagnosed during medical tests ahead of the 2014-15 was not allowed to train for almost a month."Do not put the cart before the horse," he used to reply to anyone who came to him worried about the situation at the was how he lived his life – taking it day by quickly established himself as one of the rising talents of the Portuguese league after that, but didn't change a number of teams interested in his services kept rising and yet he chose to remain living in the club's dormitory with other academy graduates and trialists that came and went until his very last day at Pacos. He was the only first-team player living there."He wouldn't leave his room. He was solely focused on his work, there was no time for distractions when it came to him," added always knew where he was heading and, throughout his life, he proved time and again the journey mattered more than the starting voyage to becoming a Portuguese hero was a beautiful one.
