Taça Brasil de Seleções 1907

Football can play a significant role in  the development of a sense of national identity. In 1907 the president of Brazil, Snr Afonso Pena, donated a trophy to be awarded to ' National Champions'. 

The first Rio de Janeiro championship had been decided in 1906 (Fluminense)  whilst the São Paulo championship had been in place since 1901 (Germania were the 1906 champions).
The governing bodies of football in the 2 principal cities (Liga Paulista de Foot-Ball (founded 1901) and Liga Metropolitana de Sports Athleticos (founded 1905)) decided against a championship playoff between the 2 champion clubs, and instead opted for a match between 2 league representative teams.
This overlooked the fact that a Bahia state championship had been played since 1905 (Clube de Natação e Regatas São Salvador were the reigning champions).
The 2 representative sides met first on 25.08.07 at São Paulo's Campo do Velódromo. 
The line ups were:

Liga Paulista de Foot-Ball
Tutu	Paulistano
Tommy	Paulistano
Walter Jeffery	Paulistano
Thiele	Germânia
Argemiro	Internacional
Gerhardt	Germânia
Einfurher	Internacional
Leônidas Bellegardes	Internacional
Aquino	Americano
Oscar de Andrade	Americano
Colston	Internacional

Distrito Federal
Waterman	Fluminense
Riether	Fluminense
Pullen	Paysandu
Mutzembecker	Internacional
A. Werneck	Paysandu
Wood	Fluminense
Oswaldo Gomes	Fluminense
Wilding	Internacional
Oscar Cox	Fluminense
E. Etchegaray	Fluminense
Waymar	Paysandu

São Paulo took a firm hold by winning the home tie by 4-1. The São Paulo goalscorers were Leônidas Bellegardes, Oscar de Andrade, Aquino and Colston. Oswaldo Gomes scored for the visitors. 
The return fixture was played  7 weeks later on 12.10.07 at Paysandu's ground.   

Distrito Federal
Waterman	Fluminense
Robinson	Paysandu
Victor  Etchegaray	Paysandu
Mutzembecker	Internacional
Pullen	Paysandu
João Leal	Fluminense
Rob	Paysandu
Oswaldo Gomes	Fluminense
Oscar Cox	Fluminense
Emile Etchegaray	Fluminense
Felix Frias	Fluminense

Liga Paulista de Foot-Ball
Tutu	Paulistano
I. Rittscher	Germânia
Walter Jeffery	Paulistano
Thiele	Germânia
Argemiro	Internacional
Gerhardt	Germânia
Einfurher	Internacional
Leônidas Bellegardes	Internacional
Aquino	Americano
Oscar de Andrade	Americano
H. Ruffin	Americano

São Paulo won this leg by 1-0 with a goal from Leônidas Bellegardes.

The Carioca Paulista theme was revived in a club competition in 1910.

Medgyessy Jenő

The Danubian influence on the football of South America predates Dori Kruschner (Dori Kürschner) and his work in Brazil. It also predates the Ferencvaros tour that allegedly influenced the style of Argentine football. 
Eugênio Medgyessy arrived in Brazil in 1926 and managed Botafogo, where in true Brazilian style he picked up a nickname-Marineti. Medgyessy later managed  Fluminense (1927-28) and  São Paulo (1932-33) before moving  to Argentina where he had spells with Racing (Club de Avellaneda), San Lorenzo and River Plate. 
As Medgyessy Jenő he had played for Ferencvaros from 1907-1919, making 80 first team appearances. Medgyessy was a League championship winner with Fradi on 4 occasions (1909-10, 1910-11, 1911-12, 1912-13) and a Cup winner in 1913. 
Despite these achievements his personal career was described as unspectacular. He received injuries whilst fighting for the central powers in 1918. Whilst in South America Medgyessy was instrumental in organizing Ferencvarosi's tour of 1929. 

São Paulo Athletic Club -three times Paulista champions

Given their role in establishing the game in São Paulo , with The Father of Brazilian Football as their player coach it was unsurprising that São Paulo Athletic Club featured so prominently in the earliest  Paulista  championships. They won the first three championships. They won again in 1911 but withdrew from serious competition in 1912, the main focus of the club shifting to Rugby Football. 

1902

P	W	D	L	F	A
8	5	2	1	21	6

Play off: São Paulo AC 2-1 Paulistano 

Squad:

Andrews *

Walter Jeffery*

Unwin *

Heyecock

Oswald L. Wucherer

Norman Biddel *

Blackock *

Brough *

Charles William Miller

P. Montandon

Herbert John Singleton Boyes*

George Kenworthy*
Albert Kenworthy*
Sparkes
Guerra
C. P. Tomkins *

Trainers: Boyes & Miller

Top Goal Scorer: Miller 10

1903

P	W	D	L	F	A
8	6	1	1	21	5

Play off: São Paulo AC 2-1 Paulistano 

Squad:
William Holland*
Walter Jeffery *
H. W. Jeans*
Francisco Robinson
Oswald L.Wucherer
Norman Biddel*
G. Pool *
Frank H. Hodgkiss*
Charles William Miller
P. Montandon
Herbert John Singleton Boyes*
R.Duff*
King*
G. H. Ford *
Heyecock
Marsland,
Normanton
Northman *
C. P. Tomkins* 
Trail *

Trainers: Boyes & Miller

Top Goal Scorer: Boyes 5

1904

P	W	D	L	F	A
11	9	2	0	29	4

Play off: São Paulo AC 1-0 Paulistano

Squad:
William Holland *
Walter Jeffery *
Frank H.Hodgkiss *
R. Duff *
Francisco Robinson
Norman Biddel *
H. W. Wright*
P. Montandon
Charles William Miller
Frank Roberton *
Herbert John Singleton Boyes *
F.MacEwan
Robottom*
Sadler*
C. Holland *   
G. H. Ford * 
Corbet 
J. T. W. Sadler *

Trainers: Boyes & Miller


Top Goal Scorers:  Boyes & Miller 9

* English players, several others were sons of British immigrants. MacEwan was a Scot.

What a great little sport, what a nice little game.

 Miller

What a great little sport, what a nice little game... this was how Charles Miller remembered the views of his compatriots when he introduced them to Association Football - at the end of the 1894 São Paulo cricket season (how different the world of cricket might have been!).
Miller's associates in São Paulo were generally English ex-pats who since 1888 had been maintaining the São Paulo Athletic Club (SPAC). There was no Association Football played at the club until Miller's return to Brazil, in fact, several months later, in April 1895- what is recognized as the first organised football match in the country was played between São Paulo Railway and The Gas Company- both teams drawn from the ranks of the SPAC. 

Miller was in England from 1884 (when he was 10) until 1894. 
Descriptions of Miller as being a 'former Southampton player' (as in 'The Southampton player who introduced football to Brazil') are inaccurate. He turned out for St Mary's, the amateur team that evolved into Southampton (hence the nickname Saints). In fact St Mary's elevation to The Southern League (and the addition of Southampton to their name) coincided with Miller's return to Brazil.
Known as 'Nipper', Miller made his St Mary's debut as a 17 year old schoolboy on the 18th April 1892. It was  the last day of the season,a friendly against an Army XI from Aldershot. Miller scored the opener in a 3-1 win. 
During the 1892–93 season, St. Mary's (who now began to employ professional players) played 27 friendly matches. Miller's level of participation in these matches is not recorded. Saints played in 7 cup matches . Miller appeared in 1 of these. 
The following season St. Mary's played 23 friendlies. Again the details are not recorded. Of 11 cup matches played Miller appeared in 3. 
Miller'sconnection with Corinthian FC was even more casual (no pun intended). He made up the numbers when Corinth were a man short in a fixture against a Hampshire County XI. He was never a club member.

There is, of course, always a counter claim to any 'foundation myth'. It's hard to imagine that the ubiquitous 'English Sailors' who feature in the football foundation mythology of just about every country in the world were not having kick abouts in Rio or São Paulo in the 20 odd years before the São Paulo Railway v Gas Company fixture. 
One noteworthy challenge to Miller's status as the father of Brazilian football comes in the form of a  31 year old Scotsman called Thomas  Donohue. Donohue was an expert in the field of dyes, and worked at a textile factory in Bangu, Rio de Janeiro . He had played a lot of football back home in Busby, and was keen to get a game going in his new neighbourhood. He imported a ball and marked out a pitch next to the factory. 

Donohue

This was where the first football match in Brazil took place in April 1894, (six months before Miller started his team in São Paolo). One fly in the ointment as regards the Donohue claim is the fact that this match was a 5 a side, due to a lack of interested parties. 
10 years later the factory was the site of the foundation of  Bangu Atlético Clube. 
There is something about these two matches that sets the scene for the early decades of the Brazilian game in  that whereas Miller introduced the game in the context of an exclusive sporting club for well to do white immigrants, Donohue brought the game to poor black and working class people. 

Palestra Italia

The 1914 visit of Torino and Pro Vercelli to Brazil  had one very tangible and lasting outcome.
Four members of the Italian community in São Paulo were inspired by the Italian clubs to found their own team. Football in Brazil, as we have seen elsewhere, was quite exclusive at the time, but more and more clubs were emerging from less privileged social groups. Since the abolition of slavery in Brazil in 1888 as many as a million Italians are reckoned to have gone there to work in the coffee industry to escape poverty at home. The club's founders were associated with the large corporation Industrie Riunite Francesco Matarazzo. The club was founded on August 26th, 1914, as Palestra Italia (Palestra being Italian for 'gymnasium' in the context of the Greek term for 'public training grounds'). 
The promotion of Italian identity and providing a focus for the Italian community of São Paulo were high on the agenda. The club colours were red white and green (like the Italian flag) and their earliest badge was the arms of the House of Savoy.

1916

In 1916, the team joined the APEA. In this first season Palestra finished bottom of the 7 team league, winning just 2 matches. 
The following year the 2 governing bodies of  São Paulo football were united, and Palestra Italia finished as runners up with a record of :

P	W	D	L	F	A	Pts
16	10	5	1	41	18	25

Palestra met their great rivals Corinthians for the first time that season, doing the double in the league matches, 3–0 and 3–1.
Caetano, who was Palestra's first international cap, scored a hattrick in the first of these games.

Caetano

1920

In 1920, Palestra Italia won their first Campeonato Paulista. Their record that season was:

P	W	D	L	F	A	Pts
16	12	2	2	55	9	26

They were champions in the seasons 1926, 1927, 1932,1933, 1934 and 1936.

In 1942 the club was rebranded as Sociedade Esportiva Palmeiras.