Narratives about Eusébio at the time of his death

Abstract

Eusébio has died! In the days following his death, the pace of comments and reactions was as catching as his football. The media almost exclusively aired comments about it, going back to old pictures of the player, with public figures coming forward to voice their opinion about Eusébio, mostly former team mates, active players, politicians, artists, and many nameless people wanting to voice their emotions. Due to his exceptional football skills while playing for SL Benfica and the Portuguese football team that made him a sports hero, the shock caused by his death hardly comes as a surprise. However, he was an unusual hero: a black African born in a colonial and discriminating society arrives in Lisbon and becomes one of the most popular figures in Portuguese society during the colonial war period. He was regarded a hero until he died. All the messages of condolences also praised the player, his human and sports qualities, his social standing, his "Portugueseness" and world dimension. This paper uses these messages of condolences sent when Eusébio died to identify the representations made of the man, assuming that at the time of his death these messages of grief reproduced the narratives made of the player over the years, as if his symbolic representation had crystallised since the 1960s.