Tiago Rech has watched Santa Cruz for so long as he can bear in mind, even when he was famously the one one. However proper now, on the ultimate day of the 2023 Campeonato Gaucho Serie A2, he can hardly bear to take action.
Their season has all come all the way down to this: one kick, one penalty to settle a shootout and ship the membership again to the state high flight for the primary time in a decade.
For Tiago, although, that is the end result of one thing far better – a lifelong love affair that has taken him in instructions he couldn’t presumably have imagined.
It has introduced him a short second of world fame, a outstanding Soccer Supervisor-esque rise to turning into president of the membership in his 20s earlier than struggling close to monetary spoil and despair as they slipped to relegation and close to oblivion.
However this isn’t a narrative that deserves an sad ending. All midfielder Mauricio has to do is rating and the fairytale is full. Within the stands, Tiago Rech watches and waits.
It was an act of watching and ready that introduced Tiago the quarter-hour of fame to set this entire ball rolling 21 years in the past.
Born simply 5 blocks from the membership’s 5,000-capacity stadium in Santa Cruz do Sul, he was an everyday on the concrete steps of Estadio dos Platanos from the age of 10, consuming a sizzling canine and watching his crew play along with his father.
As he entered his teenagers, faculty, college after which a job on a newspaper ultimately led him to a life in state capital Porto Alegre 120km away and a lowered eating regimen of video games.
In 2012, although, Santa Cruz had an away match in opposition to Gremio in his new resident metropolis – a golden alternative to be within the away finish along with his fellow Galo followers to witness their facet tackle one of many state’s greatest groups. It did not fairly work out how he deliberate.
“The sport was because of begin at 9pm and I left work round eight and went alone, on foot, with my Santa Cruz T-shirt stuffed in to my jacket simply because there can be a number of Gremio followers round and I did not need any hassle,” explains Tiago to BBC’s World Service.
“Once I bought to the stadium I went to the house reserved for our facet and I went as much as the ticket workplace and requested if any of the Santa Cruz fan base had arrived but. This was 20 minutes earlier than the sport.
“The safety stated no, however I assumed it is nonetheless early it takes two hours from Santa Cruz, possibly they have been late so I went in and sat down, ready for the sport to start out and for the remainder of the followers to reach.
“Then the sport started and nobody got here. 5 minutes glided by, then 10 after which at quarter-hour in, Santa Cruz scores the primary objective. And I am there celebrating, I imply, barely embarrassed as a result of I am the one one there.”
The tv crew watching the sport quickly seen the lone determine within the away finish and picked him out. That was when Tiago’s telephone began buzzing with calls and texts from his mother and father and associates.
“The sport went on and Gremio scored so then it was one all then 2-1 then 3-1 and in the long run they received 4-1. And I am simply there alone, the entire time,” continues Tiago.
The following morning, a picture of him sat alone within the stand, a half-drunk plastic cup subsequent to him, was on the entrance web page of the paper at which he labored. “Do not Depart Me Alone” learn the headline.
Quickly, the picture and story have been heading all over the world and drawing feedback courtesy of on-line protection and a YouTube clip that rapidly rocketed previous 1m views.
That wasn’t the tip of the story, although. It was barely the start.
A 12 months later, on the finish of a dire marketing campaign, Santa Cruz had simply been relegated to the second tier. Tiago was residing again at dwelling having left his job.
However an opportunity assembly with the then membership president gave him the possibility to show his interest into one thing extra. They bought chatting, Tiago informed him he was out of labor and a job supply was made in return.
With gamers working to season-long contracts, there have been solely 4 folks employed by the membership at the moment – the president, supervisor, a supervisor and secretary. Tiago turned the fifth, working ostensibly as their communication and advertising and marketing man, however wanting to department out into each space attainable.
“I’d search for sponsors, I’d speak to the hearth brigade about safety and to the police. So I did way more than simply communications,” he says. “I joke that that I’d find yourself taking the nook, heading the ball within the field, after which racing to the again to defend.”
This was a crash course in soccer administration, one which enabled Tiago to marry his passion-driven concepts to the sensible actuality of reaching them.
“Once I was only a fan I’d at all times be criticising from the stands,” he says. “Why did not the crew develop? Why have been we such a small membership?
“However now I may see the difficulties of being a bit soccer membership, attempting to outlive – you are coping with a scarcity of cash, lack of assets, lack of sponsors, only a basic lack of assist.”
He attended membership dinners on a Friday – a practice because the Nineteen Eighties – to rub shoulders with administrators and political figures of the town, together with the mayor.
Relationships have been constructed and concepts shared. Tiago’s revolutionary plan was for the membership to maneuver away from the fixed churn of contracting gamers and a supervisor for one quick season after which beginning over again the next 12 months. He felt they need to play all 12 months spherical, with a extra constant taking part in employees.
It intrigued the Santa Cruz advisers, a lot in order that when the time got here to elect a brand new president there was just one man for the job – the 27-year-old fan turned membership worker.
“I had dreamed for a very long time about the concept sooner or later I’d be president of the membership,” admits Tiago.
“I at all times say it isn’t an accident that I turned president at 27. The membership wasn’t doing properly, the administrators have been very previous, we would have liked new folks and so they may see I needed it so I bought elected.”
His father took extra convincing, having seen the detrimental influence the function had taken on associates of his, however finally backed his son’s dream.
It rapidly turned a nightmare.
“To start with it was nice,” explains Tiago. “We bought some good gamers, I bought some new sponsors, we began successful however by the third month issues have been going incorrect
“We began to expire of cash, the video games have been taking place within the winter and it will get very chilly right here, it rains, so there weren’t so many followers coming to the matches which meant we have been promoting fewer tickets and in the long run it bought very onerous.”
Money owed started to pile up. Tiago requested his father for a mortgage to pay gamers, he maxed out bank cards and put all of his financial savings into the membership – cash his mother and father had helped him amass to make use of to purchase an condo.
Santa Cruz prevented relegation however Tiago’s one 12 months of presidency had taken a heavy toll.
“I bought very depressed,” he says. “When the championship was over I’d keep in mattress all day. I used to be simply unhappy and so down, to the extent that I needed to go to the physician and get medicine to attempt to get higher.
“Ultimately the physician and my dad got here to the choice that I wanted to cease working the membership that I wanted return to my previous life.”
So that’s what he did. He bought remedy for his despair, moved again to Port Alegre, returned to journalism and have become only a humble fan of Santa Cruz as soon as extra.
Sadly, the membership’s fortunes didn’t enhance. After seasons of wrestle, they have been relegated to the third tier in 2018, prompting recommendations they might must fold.
It was round this time that Tiago returned to his dwelling city and ran into an previous buddy, an area enterprise proprietor, who made a loopy however determined plea to him – that the membership would shut except he got here again as president.
Regardless of all that had gone earlier than, he determined to take up the problem, however this time armed with classes from the previous. They constructed slowly, accrued sponsors, paid off money owed.
“It actually helped that our gamers got here from the town, so the neighborhood supported us – households would come to the sport so we had followers and an revenue and we began to have the ability to repay our payments,” says Tiago.
It’s to testomony to the work accomplished that even a world pandemic that interrupted two seasons was unable to halt their progress. In reality, it could even have helped the membership to a level.
In September 2020, it was determined {that a} shortened championship season would happen, with solely 10 groups collaborating. The absence of a number of the greater golf equipment enabled Santa Cruz to persuade members of their squads to come back and play for them.
With their assist, three months later the membership received their first-ever title – the Copa Federacao Gaucha de Futebol.
“It was unbelievable, incredible, sensational, I cried, I celebrated,” remembers Tiago. “The video games have been a bit unusual as a result of there was no crowds, only a few folks have been watching.” It’s a feeling Tiago is aware of properly.
After the sport, a photographer requested him to recreate the well-known shot of him within the away finish in 2012, however this time, as a substitute of a plastic consuming cup beside him, he had the membership’s first ever piece of silverware. As soon as once more, Tiago’s picture went viral all over the world.
Extra success was to observe. He would log off his tenure as president by overseeing the membership’s return to the second tier earlier than handing over the reins to the identical buddy who had prompted his return to the function three years earlier.
All midfielder Mauricio has to do is rating and the fairytale is full.
Tiago Rech watches from the stands, not a lone fan however certainly one of 1000’s, barely in a position to watch however hoping and praying.
Cool as you want, Mauricio strokes the ball previous the goalkeeper and the gang erupts. After a decade away, little Santa Cruz are again within the state high flight, the Campeonato Gaucho.
After the preliminary rush of celebration has died down, with the gamers nonetheless soaking all of it in on the pitch, reporters hunt down Tiago, to remind everybody of his story, his sacrifices and, now, to share in his pleasure.
“I am simply grateful to all of the Galo followers, to those that by no means stopped believing like me, to my household, my father Carlos my mom, my brothers Rodrigo and Paulo this win is for you as all of them have ever been,” he says, his voice breaking.
Tiago continues to work with Santa Cruz, however is now content material – a lot to his father’s aid – to permit others to steer. His mission full.
He insists that he’ll proceed to be there, following their video games, ceaselessly a fan. Even when he is the one one.
