Garrincha: The Triumph and Tragedy of Brazil's Forgotten Footballing Hero

Garrincha was the unlikeliest of footballers - with a ruight leg that turned inwards and a left that turned out, he looked as if he could barely walk, but with a ball at his feet he had the poise of an angel. He played for the loove of the game, uninterested in money, and ignoring tactical advice. And he was as wild off the pitch as he was mesmerizing on it - mischievous, audacious and dripping with sex appeal. It was his affair and subsequent marriage to the singer Elza Soares that caught the imagination of a nation and samba made them the toast of 1960s Rio. But by the age of forty-nine, Garrincha was dead, destropyed by the excessesn that made him so compelling."--Back cover.