blog from the guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/aug/12/bebe-street-kid-manchester-united
Bébé the street kid now living the dream at Manchester United
The skills learned on a concrete tennis court have transformed the life of United's new £7.4m striker
Bébé has 'a natural creativity, an irreverence, and that makes all the difference,' says a former coach of the 20-year-old striker. Photograph: Hugo Delgado/EPA
When the news broke on Tuesday night that
Sir Alex Ferguson had bought yet another striker, the reaction of many
Manchester United supporters was remarkably similar to when the signing of Javier Hernández was announced in April. Sometimes there is no use pretending and, in the case of Bébé, even the sharpest and most cosmopolitan football minds were at a loss to produce a single anecdote or make sense of how a footballer who previously had no Wikipedia site, registered with a club in Portugal's third division only five weeks ago, had suddenly arrived at Old Trafford in a whirlwind £7.4m deal.
A few months since Hernández's signing, the Mexican has already demonstrated United's scouting staff may have discovered one of those players who make all the frustrations of management worthwhile. In the coming months we will discover whether the 20-year-old Bébé will come to be regarded in a similar way. Equally, there are enough examples at Old Trafford – Dong Fangzhou, Manucho, even Diego Forlán – to realise it can easily go the other way. All we can be certain of is the two strikers recruited as back-up for Wayne Rooney tell the story of how football closes divides.
While Hernández grew up amid the pastoral delights of Guadalajara, born into one of Mexico's foremost football families, and studied business administration at one of the country's top universities, Bébé's story includes time living rough before being "rescued" and given a place at Casa do Gaiato, a charitable institution in Loures, north of Lisbon, for orphans or underprivileged children. It is, in many ways, a movie in the making. It is said that when Bébé (the nickname his older brother gave him) is back in Loures he still stays at the imposing concrete building he called home. It was there he learned to play, often on a concrete tennis court.
"He's a player who is the fruit of street football," Jorge Paixão, his manager at Estrela da Amadora, says. "Nowadays players are schooled at the clubs but he has none of this. He's an old-school player. He learned to play in the street and has that natural creativity, an irreverence, and that makes all the difference."
Bébé – or Tiago Manuel Dias Correia to give him his proper name – was born to Cape Verdean parents, the same as his new colleague Nani. This was in the Sintra municipality, a region of great natural beauty, with its national park, the mountain range, the Pena Palace and the ninth century Castelo dos Mouros.
Thousands of Lisbon people come here as tourists each year and Lord Byron talked of it being "the most beautiful place in the world" but Bébé's family lived in poverty in Cacem, a dormitory town described by one travel journalist as "an awful place, sharing neither the beauties of the countryside, nor the cultural richness of a real city".
He played for the youth team in Loures and it was while living at Casa do Gaiato that he was invited to turn out for CAIS, a partner organisation of the
Homeless World Cup.
Soon afterwards, Bébé was picked up by Estrela da Amadora, a small club from the Lisbon suburbs. On the face of it, his statistics are not particularly impressive – four goals in 26 appearances – but it was enough for Vitória de Guimarães to offer him a five-year contract in the summer when he became available on a free transfer.
Take away the romanticism of a classic rags-to-riches story, though, and it does leave questions of United's management. Do they need an eighth striker? And why did they not go for him when he would have cost nothing? Carlos Queiroz got involved and Ferguson, trusting the word of his former assistant, persuaded the Glazers to pay the €9m buyout clause that Guimarães had invoked.
"He's a player we've been following but he really came on the scene in the last week or so," David Gill, United's chief executive, said. "He's a potential player and a lot of Manchester United's focus is about getting players who have the potential. Let's hope it works out."
Guimarães are the big winners, having "flipped" the player, and they say they received four offers, including one from Real Madrid. As for Bébé, United are booking him in for English lessons and a life of riches lies ahead. "I had a dream of playing for a major club," he said. "That dream has come true. Football can change lives."
