Ferenc Meszarosformer goalkeeper of Sporting, Farense and Vitória FC de Setúbal, died this Monday at the age of 72, learned the zero zero.
Meszaros lived in Hungary and was at home with his wife, a doctor, and son when he felt unwell. In recent years he had developed depression and apathy, and he rarely left the house.
Raised in the historic Vasas SC, in Budapest, Meszaros arrived in Portugal to represent Sporting in 1981. He grabbed the starting line-up in goal and played 80 official matches in two years. In the first season he was soon national champion and won the Portuguese Cup, titles to which he added the Super Cup in the summer of 1982.
In 1983 he left for Farense and spent three years at a good level in Setúbal at the end of his career, from 1986 to 1989. Internationally for Hungary, Meszaros added 29 caps and played in the 1978 and 1982 World Cups.
The story doesn’t end here. Years later, in the mid-1990s, Ferenc Meszaros took over the technical command of Lourinhanense, Sporting’s satellite team at the time. The story was told by Rui Miguel Tovar and recalls a period of great difficulties experienced by the Meszaros family in Hungary after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Rebel, little given to rules, Meszaros gave an interview to Saturday in 2016, shortly before the Portugal-Hungary match of that European Championship of good memory. And it brought back good memories.
«Best performance in Portugal? For Vitória, where we beat FC Porto, up there, by 1-0 [Aparício, aos 55 minutos]. I saved everything, everything, everything, even a penalty from Rui Águas. In that team, Artur Jorge already launched two interesting youngsters: Vítor Baía and Domingos.»
Another story linked to this game became famous. For the triumph in Antas, the president of Vitória promised 100 contos to each athlete. At the end of the game, the bad boy Meszaros approached him and demanded the amount.
«In the locker room, Fernando Oliveira congratulates the whole team. Meszaros approaches him ‘and the hundred contos?’. Fernando Oliveira had to go around there and get the money. When I arrived, Meszaros gave me 20 contos. ‘For the service scorer’»recalled Aparício himself, in conversation with the newspaper i.
