Andreas Pereira becomes first player born outside Brazil to score for Selecao | Brazilian team

On the day the CBF celebrated 110 years of its foundation, for the first time in history a player born outside Brazil scored a goal for the Seleção. Born in Tuffel, Belgium, Andreas Pereira was responsible for the feat as he beat Mexico 3-2 in a friendly last Saturday.

The son of Brazilians, Andreas grew up in Europe, where his father, also a footballer, played for most of his career. As a teenager, he played for Belgium’s youth teams, making 27 appearances and scoring 13 goals between the under-15 and under-17 divisions.

However, the midfielder guarantees that the dream is to play hopscotch. A possibility that seemed far-fetched became real when he was 17 when he received a visit from Alexandre Gallo, Brazil’s youth wing coordinator. He accepted the invitation to transfer Belgium to Brazil without hesitation.

Chance in the main team will come only in 2018, Tide who invited him for friendship. Andreas played 23 minutes of the match against El Salvador and had to wait almost six years before he got his chance again in March 2024 with Dorival Junior.

– Of course it is very difficult to be away from the national team for a long time, but I always believed and people around me told me that I should work hard to return one day. I have always kept this dream alive and thank God, I am now reaping the rewards after working so hard for so long – celebrated the Fulham midfielder.

His first goal for the senior team came in the fourth match, his first as a starter. Andreas did well, not just finding the net.

– It’s an incredible, indescribable feeling, I’m so happy, it still hasn’t sunk in that I scored the first goal. I had a lot going on in my head at the time and everything I went through had to be here. It was my childhood dream to score for the national team and today I am living that moment. I am very happy – he said.

For more than a century, the five-time world champions have had some players born in other countries, but none of them have been able to find the net. They are:

• Sydney Bullen (English) – three games;
• Casemiro do Amaral (Portuguese) – six games;
• Francisco Police (Italian) – a game;

There is also disagreement about where Adolfo Millman, known as Rousseau, who played the game of hopscotch, was born. Records point to Pelotas on the Rio Grande do Sul as his hometown, but over the years there has been a legend that he was born in the territory of the Russian Empire in what is now Afghanistan. Years later, the family discovered that the former striker was born in Argentina, as reported by Esporte Espadacular.

Like other “foreigners”, Russo failed to score for the national team. Such a feat would fall to Andreas Pereira, the most Brazilian in Belgium.