Carlos Henrique Raposo, commonly known as Carlos Kaiser due to a purported resemblance to Franz Beckenbauer when he was young, was born on the 2nd of April 1963 in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. He would become one of the most iconic figures in world football, but not for his ability on the pitch as Kaiser lived life to the brim. In his pomp he was everything from fixer to gigolo to party planner to gangster’s pet. Most of all, he was football's finest conman. Renato Gaúcho, one of the finest Brazilian players of his generation, calls Kaiser "the greatest footballer never to have played football." He had a career spanning more than two decades, during which he was associated with Rio’s four biggest clubs – Flamengo, Fluminense, Botafogo and Vasco da Gama – as well as Bangu, América and a number of overseas teams signing deals with Botafogo, Flamengo, Bangu, Fluminense, Vasco da Gama, America, Puebla, El Paso and Gazelec Ajaccio but never playing a minute for any of the teams. The one time he came closest to playing, against Coritiba, he got into a fight with the fans and was sent off before taking the field. He became a legend in South America for his party boy lifestyle that came with conning so many teams and even had a documentary made about his astonishing life, called: 'The Greatest Footballer to Never Play Football'. He says, "I wanted to be among the other players. I just didn’t want to play. It's everybody else's problem if they want me to be a footballer. Not even Jesus pleased everybody. Why would I? The players knew about it, but they were all friends of mine. I cheated the doctors. There was a time in the team I played for when they really wanted me to play and I had a friend who was a dentist. The president of the club came up to me and said, 'You never play!' I said, 'I have the medical report here and they finally found out what my problem is. It's a dental problem." One team became so frustrated with his injuries that they called in a witch doctor; Kaiser brusquely informed him to just take the money as there was nothing wrong with him. While at Brazilian club Botafogo at some point during the 1990s, Kaiser would carry around a toy mobile phone around and his teammates often found him huddled in the corner of the dressing room talking into his toy. His conversations, a mixture of Portuguese and English, were just loud enough for his teammates and manager to hear him talking of potentially transferring elsewhere. Kaiser wanted the club to dismiss him before he was forced to play, hoping that knowing he was in talks with other clubs, would anger his bosses and convince them to get rid of him.
The documentary about him includes interviews with legends of Brazilian football such as Carlos Alberto, Zico, Júnior, Bebeto and Renato Gaúcho – not to mention multiple interviews with Kaiser. Bebeto, the World Cup-winning striker of 1994 says: "His chat was so good that if you let him open his mouth, that would be it. He'd charm you. You couldn’t avoid it. That would be it." Using his profile and self-confessed good looks, Kaiser harnessed his profile for one main reason, womanising. Claiming that he went to orgies with Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi he said: "I am the best football player who has never played football... I slept with 1,000 women and pretended to be injured my entire career. Every night I was in nightclubs until the early hours of the morning, Monday to Monday. I was never in a condition to train or play in the morning. I made sure I was seen with the best Brazilian football players. Just being a football player made me a magnet for women. I was a sex addict, like Michael Douglas. I would sleep with at least three women a day." Kaiser’s main skill in getting new contracts was signing as part of a deal with his professional friends. He'd then win over the staff at the club with his charm, and manage to get a contract long enough to bring home a superstar's wage.
see also :- http://www.thefootballvoice.com/2024/10/footballs-nearly-men-adriano.html
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