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Graham Hunter
Antony Matheus dos Santos has such powerful first-hand experience in fighting his way out of hellish circumstances that it might explain why the Brazilian winger is making such a thrilling success of his loan move from Manchester United to Real Betis.
His impact on Manuel Pellegrini’s Verdiblancos has been such that having his red card during Sunday’s’ 2-1 win at Getafe overturned on appeal is a huge boost for Betis when Real Madrid visit the Benito Villamarin stadium on Saturday (stream LIVE at 12:30 p.m. ET on ESPN+). United’s executives, coaching staff and fans will, inevitably, be rubbing their eyes in frustrated disbelief at that notion. But it’s true.
The guy who somehow elbowed his way out of one of São Paolo’s crime-devastated, drug-riddled neighbourhoods — where he once had to step over a dead body in an alleyway on his route to school — has also shrugged off the private hell of failing to impose himself in the Premier League, feeling abandoned and discredited, only to soar again.
Admittedly it wasn’t a great way to celebrate his 25th birthday on Monday: waking with the realisation that his sparkling, exuberant play which (again) powered Betis to three points against a gnarly rival (they’d only won once at Getafe in the last eight years) had been overshadowed by his late, dubious, but wholly unnecessary sending-off.
Getafe, for the uninitiated, are a gritty, aggressive southern Madrid outfit who’ve adopted it as their personal mission to ensure that everyone remembers that football is a contact sport. Lots and lots of contact, inside and outside the laws of the game. Win, lose or draw at Getafe, you come away bruised — spiritually as well as physically.
Antony, however, treated the whole experience as a walk in the park, a chance to flaunt his extravagant skills. Catch me if you can, kick me if you can … stop me if you dare. Compared to where he grew up, dribbling past gangsters and taunting drug dealers with the ball on the rough, hard-earth pitches in São Paolo where he often played barefoot until he bled, this was nothing.
“I was born in hell. That’s not a joke … the favela where I grew up in São Paulo is actually called Inferninho — ‘Little Hell,'” he told The Players Tribune in 2022. “If you really want to understand me as a person, then you must understand where I am from.
“Fifteen steps from our front door, there were always drug dealers doing their business, passing stuff hand-to-hand … we were so used to seeing guns that it was not even scary. They were just a part of everyday life.”
Some of what the winger needed to carve a route out of that life remains with Antony — for good and bad.
His press and then possession-rob off Diego Rico, erupting into a lovely darting dribble which took him past two rivals then laser-guided assist for Isco to put Betis 1-0 up continued Antony’s run of producing something impactful in every single match he’s played since temporarily leaving behind his failed £82 million move from Ajax to Manchester United.
Before the end of the game, his killer pass brought Betis their penalty, and Isco’s winning goal, meaning the gifted Brazilian has now scored twice, produced two goal assists and prompted two (scored) penalties in six appearances for his new club.
When he arrived, Betis were 12th in LaLiga and five points off European qualification. Now they’re seventh and tied on points for a UEFA place next season. That’s an impressive impact, and stats enough to make Man United fans weep.
At Betis, Antony looks happy, authoritative, and his partnership with Isco is spellbinding — he carries the threat of goals or danger in every possession, and the passionate Andaluz fans absolutely love him. He’s unrecognisable. Unless, that is, you followed him at Ajax, São Paulo, or Brazil’s Olympic gold medal-winning team where he scored, shone and felt “understood.” Can you spot the odd one out?
Antony’s move to Old Trafford looks destined to become one of the worst value transfers in years, given that the amount spent to sign him has yielded such a poor return in terms of goals (15 goal contributions in 96 appearances) and decisive performances. But the problem wasn’t exclusively his, by any means. Manchester United is a Bermuda Triangle for talent right now. But there’s context. I chatted with Benni McCarthy, United’s striker coach during the first two years of Antony’s time at Old Trafford, and he’s both thrilled and unsurprised at how things are playing out.
“Antony has nice ways about him — he trains well, he’ll really listen to his coaches because he’s willing to learn,” McCarthy said. “When a concept clicks with him it really clicks, he has skills in abundance and, unlike most players of his ability, he’s always willing to get back and help his defender or to press and rob the ball.
“I recognise his personality because he was born in a favela and I grew up playing with gangsters in the opposition team or on the touchline. He’s got a good nasty streak in him … if you kick him then be prepared to be kicked back.
“But I loved watching him in training, taking the mickey out of other players with the ball — he has so much dazzling ability that I was hugely disappointed that, simply because he was young, there were too many expectations and there’s no time to settle-in at United, it looked like he wasn’t going to make it. Now he’s showing people his real level. He’s gifted.”
There’s context at Betis too. They and United have a good relationship based on two recent friendly matches and one meeting in the 2023 Europa League (where Antony scored in a 4-1 win). That facilitated the business side of the loan where, I’m guided, Betis did well: negotiating a €1.5m fee from January to June. The key was persuading Antony himself, because there was a tempting offer from Villarreal on the table.
But it appealed to him, and United, that Betis promised that so long as he was fit and performing well not only would he play the majority of the minutes until the end of the season but that they’d send consistent reports on his training data to the Carrington training ground staff back in Manchester; that way his parent club would feel involved and up to date in his progression.
Antony fell for the idea that Seville was a city which would feel “Brazilian”; colourful, passionate, football-obsessed, a place where many of his countrymen had flourished (both for Real Betis and Sevilla), and — crucially — sunny. Boy oh boy, that mattered. If you’ve ever lived in Manchester, you’ll understand why and how much.
It was far from irrelevant that so many Brazilian friends or contacts pushed him to join the Verdiblancos. Denilson, still one of the club’s record signings and a world-record transfer fee back in the day, immediately got in touch and firmly pushed Antony to join Betis. Ricardo Oliveira, a hugely cherished striker there thanks to his 32 goals in 62 matches in green-and-white, also São Paolo born, sent him a long video message telling Antony that this was the club to start enjoying himself and strutting his stuff again.
Nor is it irrelevant that the club’s all-time most loved and famous footballer, Joaquín Sánchez, was a winger who shared lots of Antony’s abilities and attitudes to life — and who’s now a senior voice in both the board of directors and the football department. He likes Antony, saw a kindred spirit and found, immediately, that head coach Pellegrini was on board.
Antony arrived at a place where there was the warmth of the southern Spanish sun but, equally, the warmth of a club that had faith in him, that actively wanted him to soar, to be a main protagonist, and the untapped adoration of a fanbase which passionately wants arrogance, chutzpah and invention from its ball-players.
The fact that Isco, another rough diamond whom Pellegrini has restored to 24-carat status, immediately supported Antony’s arrival and looks for him with the ball every time they play together is the icing on the cake. Talent recognises talent.
The irony, of course, is that the better Antony performs the harder it will become for Betis to keep him. He has at least two more seasons under contract to United after this one, and while the Spanish club are already concocting strategies to persuade manager Ruben Amorim and the United money men to extend the loan for another year. the fact is that when he’s playing like his is at the moment, Antony’s value — either to United’s coach or in the transfer market– will soar.
In the meantime, those of us who enjoy Spanish football simply need to enjoy and be thankful that a proper talent is smiling, feeling the warmth of the sun on his back, and performing to his proper level again.
