Sandro da Silva remembers the first stranger who ever recognized him on the street. Four days after his debut fot CDT. That day the old local man grabbed his hand like he was family. That was seven years ago now, but the feeling never really left Sandro, it just got lost, buried under something he'd not thought about in a long time.
He used to walk everywhere. People forget that, or maybe they never knew unless they encountered him out and about. Sundays at the market, tacos from the same street vendor every week. Local kids would stop him to take selfies. Sandro liked being part of the community, after all, he was just a kid from Natal at the time who had been embraced by a city of millions, and walking around unguarded felt like proof of that acceptance.
Two seasons ago, Johnny Elliot’s cousin was shot while being robbed at gunpoint outside of Johnny’s home. He was targeted because the whole block knew who his cousin was, and the kind of money he made playing at CDT. It shook that player and his family to the point that he demanded a trade and was swapped to Reykjavik. It was a shocking time for everyone involved with the club and likely affected the results toward the end of that season.
Something changed in Sandro after that incident, and he hasn’t fully recovered that trust in his city. His driver takes him almost everywhere now. The routes change from week to week without much explanation as to why. When in public he keeps a security detail. However, nothing stops Sandro from going out. He still stops for photos when fans approach him at a restaurant and still signs the jerseys people thrust in his face at club events. Though he will never again go looking for those moments the way he once did, part of him misses it more than most people could imagine.
Sandro was shocked by the lack of resentment the city had for him after this change in lifestyle. He'd braced for accusations of a God complex, of hiding behind blacked out SUVs like every other rich, out-of-touch footballer in the league. Instead the fans seemed to want him safe more than anything else. The children still waved and his fans outside the stadium still chanted his name. His caution earned him a strange kind of goodwill, and Sandro had the sense that whatever he gave the city in those first few years had been enough for them to love him forever, without conditions.
Two seasons ago Sandro looked like a fading player. His first touch got heavier, and defenders who used to fear his lightning quick first step started to read him. For the first time, doubt began to creep into his training sessions. He was second guessing his positioning and scared to go past opposing defenders. He woke up every morning wondering if this was just what aging felt like for a player the media once referred to as a generational prospect. He was hardly the first to slowly fade into oblivion.
However, Sandro rejected it outright, fighting back with everything he had in him, and that clear and obvious refusal kept the supporters on his side. His ascension was slow, but the mornings he stayed late with the fitness staff regaining his burst and a summer in Lisbon spent with a sports scientist rewired his body to reach its full potential once again. Small gains, match after match, added up to visible improvements in his performances.
This season the improvement shows in the numbers. Sandro has two assists through seven matches, which matches his total from last season. Tenochtitlan sit fourth in the table, hardly the position anyone expected from a squad with this much talent, but only four points off the top of the table with roughly two thirds of the season left to play. Nobody in the CDT locker room is calling it a crisis… yet. There’s actually been a real sharpness in training recently that suggests they might be up for the challenge this season.
This isn’t enough for Sandro, however, as his goal this year was to lift the league trophy. He knows what he’s capable of, and he's touched something close to his ceiling years earlier when he was playing with freedom and winning awards in Krung Thep. The two brutally tough seasons haven't broken him or convinced him that those stretches where he’s unplayable are behind him, if anything they've made him obsessive about proving he can still reach the heights he expects of himself.
Sandro beats on. Like waves against the sand. Continuing the same patterns while eroding his obstacles on his path to greatness.
No strangers are grabbing his hand on the sidewalk these days, and no more Sunday afternoons at the taco stand. Yet his hunger for greatness remains, if anything the years have sharpened it. Sandro isn't done chasing the player he still believes he can become, or the legacy that he believes he will one day embrace.
He used to walk everywhere. People forget that, or maybe they never knew unless they encountered him out and about. Sundays at the market, tacos from the same street vendor every week. Local kids would stop him to take selfies. Sandro liked being part of the community, after all, he was just a kid from Natal at the time who had been embraced by a city of millions, and walking around unguarded felt like proof of that acceptance.
Two seasons ago, Johnny Elliot’s cousin was shot while being robbed at gunpoint outside of Johnny’s home. He was targeted because the whole block knew who his cousin was, and the kind of money he made playing at CDT. It shook that player and his family to the point that he demanded a trade and was swapped to Reykjavik. It was a shocking time for everyone involved with the club and likely affected the results toward the end of that season.
Something changed in Sandro after that incident, and he hasn’t fully recovered that trust in his city. His driver takes him almost everywhere now. The routes change from week to week without much explanation as to why. When in public he keeps a security detail. However, nothing stops Sandro from going out. He still stops for photos when fans approach him at a restaurant and still signs the jerseys people thrust in his face at club events. Though he will never again go looking for those moments the way he once did, part of him misses it more than most people could imagine.
Sandro was shocked by the lack of resentment the city had for him after this change in lifestyle. He'd braced for accusations of a God complex, of hiding behind blacked out SUVs like every other rich, out-of-touch footballer in the league. Instead the fans seemed to want him safe more than anything else. The children still waved and his fans outside the stadium still chanted his name. His caution earned him a strange kind of goodwill, and Sandro had the sense that whatever he gave the city in those first few years had been enough for them to love him forever, without conditions.
Two seasons ago Sandro looked like a fading player. His first touch got heavier, and defenders who used to fear his lightning quick first step started to read him. For the first time, doubt began to creep into his training sessions. He was second guessing his positioning and scared to go past opposing defenders. He woke up every morning wondering if this was just what aging felt like for a player the media once referred to as a generational prospect. He was hardly the first to slowly fade into oblivion.
However, Sandro rejected it outright, fighting back with everything he had in him, and that clear and obvious refusal kept the supporters on his side. His ascension was slow, but the mornings he stayed late with the fitness staff regaining his burst and a summer in Lisbon spent with a sports scientist rewired his body to reach its full potential once again. Small gains, match after match, added up to visible improvements in his performances.
This season the improvement shows in the numbers. Sandro has two assists through seven matches, which matches his total from last season. Tenochtitlan sit fourth in the table, hardly the position anyone expected from a squad with this much talent, but only four points off the top of the table with roughly two thirds of the season left to play. Nobody in the CDT locker room is calling it a crisis… yet. There’s actually been a real sharpness in training recently that suggests they might be up for the challenge this season.
This isn’t enough for Sandro, however, as his goal this year was to lift the league trophy. He knows what he’s capable of, and he's touched something close to his ceiling years earlier when he was playing with freedom and winning awards in Krung Thep. The two brutally tough seasons haven't broken him or convinced him that those stretches where he’s unplayable are behind him, if anything they've made him obsessive about proving he can still reach the heights he expects of himself.
Sandro beats on. Like waves against the sand. Continuing the same patterns while eroding his obstacles on his path to greatness.
No strangers are grabbing his hand on the sidewalk these days, and no more Sunday afternoons at the taco stand. Yet his hunger for greatness remains, if anything the years have sharpened it. Sandro isn't done chasing the player he still believes he can become, or the legacy that he believes he will one day embrace.
![[Image: C75197-D1-9-E74-4-DC5-836-E-981-D75-A96413.png]](https://i.postimg.cc/nc8qJ0Nf/C75197-D1-9-E74-4-DC5-836-E-981-D75-A96413.png)
