Fan trades 1950 final ticket for three 2014 counterparts

In spite of holding a ticket, Brazilian football fan Joedir Sancho Belmont could not attend the final match of the World Cup in 1950 at the Maracanã Stadium between Brazil and Uruguay. He kept the ticket for 64 years, and as a result, at the age of 85, this Friday (Jun 27), he received two tickets for the 2014 World Cup final duel from FIFA Secretary-General Jérôme Valcke.

“Now I’ll have the chance to watch another final match at Maracanã, and, if everything goes well, Brazil will take their revenge this time,” he said, referring to Uruguay’s 2-1 win over Brazil in the 1950 World Cup. At the occasion, Belmont missed the game because his mother fell sick and passed away a couple of days later.

But he kept the ticket through all those years, and, months before the World Cup in Brazil, he decided to give them away to FIFA’s museum, in Switzerland, to be inaugurated next year. He asked his son José Augusto to send a letter to the football association to make his offer. His son says he never thought FIFA would answer. “It was a great surprise to win these tickets. He couldn’t make to the final in 1950, but at least he will this year,” his son said, who also won a ticket to keep his father company.

Translated by Fabrício Ferreira