Martim Francisco Ribeiro de Andrada (21 February 1928 – 22 June 1982) was a Brazilian association football coach. He is widely credited with the invention of the 4–2–4 formation when guiding his first club, the Villa Nova AC of Nova Lima, to the State Championship of Minas Gerais in 1951. He won further state championships with Atlético Mineiro of Belo Horizonte in 1953, CR Vasco da Gama of Rio de Janeiro in 1956 and SE Gama of Brasília in 1979. Other clubs he coached include Corinthians, Cruzeiro, America FC of Rio de Janeiro and Athletic Bilbao in Spain. With Bangu AC he won the State Champions' Cup of 1967.
Martim Francisco, scion of a distinguished Brazilian family – his ancestors include José Bonifácio de Andrada e Silva, considered the "Patriarch of Brazilian Independence", and many other lustrous personalities – studied psychology and law.José Hamílton Ribeiro: A leilão dos miseráveis, Realidade (magazine), Editora Abril, September 1973, p. 83, et al. An accident prevented him from playing football beyond the youth level and he never acquired a formal coaching diploma. In 1954 it was reported that he had 650 books about football, of which he considered El preparador técnico from Spain and Tácticas y técnicas from Argentina as the most important ones. In his opinion, the WM of Herbert Chapman and the third defender of Izidor Kürschner were the basis of all tactics. He considered from early on the intermingling of club officials with the work of the coach as a major problem. His bynames included primeiro lorde dos gramados brasileiros ("First Lord of the Brazilian fields"), professor and cientista do futebol ("Scientist of Football"). He died aged 54 from alcohol related illness.
Career
Early years: from Minas Gerais via Rio de Janeiro to Spain The 13-years old Martim Francisco joined the local team Olympic where he played as goalkeeper – with a brief interlude at EC Juventus – until an accident forced him to stop playing football. When the final course of his university studies took him to Rio de Janeiro, he had in 1948 the chance of getting a closer look at the coaching profession under the notable Uruguayan coach Ondino Viera, who then was in charge of Fluminense FC. On return to Minas Gerais he worked as assistant to Urbano Santos, who coached the state amateur team. In 1950 he became director of the regional department (departemento do interior) of the state football association FMF.
Martim Francisco commenced his club-coaching career 1951 at Villa Nova AC, based in Nova Lima. The club had won in the 1930s four times the state championship and since then had turned into one of the lesser sides of the competition. Francisco replaced the then common WM-formation, introduced to Brazil in the late 1930s by the Hungarian Izidor Kürschner and developed further by Flávio Costa, with the 4–2–4 system, which means the tactical line-up of the team consisted of four defenders, two midfielders and four attackers. To provide more equilibrium in the natural flow of a match one of the attackers was ordered back to midfield when the team was defending and on defender moved forward when the team was in attack. This concept is widely regarded an invention of Martim Francisco - at least he is credited with being the first one to having deliberately deployed it - and was used by the Brazilian national side when it won the World Cups of 1958 and 1962, albeit in the latter tournament evolved largely to a 4–3–3.Various authors: Causa Mortis: Retranca, Placar, 7 September 1973, p. 16.Jonathan Wilson: Inverting the Pyramid, Orion Books, London, 2008. Chapter 7.Miguel Lourenço Pereira: , futebolmagazine, 2 July 2012. Martim Francisco found the inspiration to the system by observing the final of the Copa Rio in July 1951 in the Maracanã Stadium, where SE Palmeiras of São Paulo overwhelmed Juventus FC of Turin in Italy. He thought, that Juventus might be able to reverse the flow of the match by pulling back one of their five attackers to midfield and a midfielder back to defence, transforming their 3–2–5 formation effectively to 4–2–4.
With this tactic he led Villa Nova, with some aid of Prão, a former player of the club who also held coaching responsibilities, to the State Championship of 1951, decided in matches against Atlético Mineiro in January 1952. This remains to date the last state championship of the club. Star of this side was the left-winger Benedito Custódio Ferreira "Escurinho", who later played for Fluminense and the national team.
Martim Francisco continued his career in 1952 with EC Siderúrgica from Sabará, also in the vicinity of the capital, state champions of 1937, which he took to the second place of the competition. In this year he also achieved a notable win with the state's youth team over the selection of Rio de Janeiro.
After this Martim Francisco coached the state's oldest and most successful club, Atlético Mineiro in the capital Belo Horizonte. He led the club in 1953 to its 16th state title. He left the club after a friendly match in Rio de Janeiro against Botafogo FR in mid March 1954. At least between 1951 and 1953 he was also coach of the state selection of Minas Gerais, which competed in the Campeonato Brasileiro de Seleções Estaduais, the championship of state teams.
His new club was America FC in the then national capital Rio de Janeiro where he succeeded by the end of March 1954 Otto Glória, who should later rise to fame in Europe with SL Benfica. In the ensuing Rio-São Paulo Tournament between the leading clubs of both cities America finished only eighth in a field of ten participants, but he could raise the team to second place in the Rio State Championship, behind CR Flamengo. 1955 brought improvement with a now fifth place in the Torneio Rio-São Paulo. In the State Championship America stayed in the race until the end, when a deciding matches against Flamengo had to be held end of March 1956. But by mid march Martim Francisco and America had already parted ways in deep controversy, after Francisco had signed for local rivals CR Vasco da Gama. America lost those matches under the Francisco's assistant coach Antônio Carlos Mangualde. Leônidas da Silva, the ageing top scorer of the 1938 World Cup, Canário who later played for Real Madrid, and the Argentine Martín Alarcón were amongst the best known players of America in these years.
In Vasco da Gama, Martim Francisco followed Flávio Costa. Over the last years the team had been in decline after its golden era when it was known as Expresso da Vitória. With the glamorous defender Hilderaldo Bellini, Orlando Peçanha and Vavá, all players that would feature in Brazil's World Cup winning side of 1958, Vasco won its first State Championship since 1952. In 1957 Vasco undertook a tour of Europe. There it won in June the well regarded tournaments of La Coruña in Spain and of Paris. In the final of the Trofeo Teresa Herrera Vasco defeated Athletic Bilbao 4–2 and at the Tournoi de Paris the European Champions Real Madrid with 4–3. In another friendly FC Barcelona was defeated 7–2 on their ground.02 Amistosos e Torneios, Ficha do Jogo. The ensuing State Championship was less successful and Vasco finished only fourth. The relationship between Francisco and the club, at least in the end, was not amicable. In the context of his departure word was also spread, that he would be drinking irresponsibly.Quanto maior o beque mais eu batia, Placar, 8 January 1971 p. 19. In the article former player Almir Pernambuquinho is quoted as follows: "Martim Francisco was great. Management wanted to get rid of him and therefore invented a story that he would drink irresponsibly. If all our coaches would have been like him, Brazilian football would not know any competition it would be unbeatable. Martim had another quality: he never pandered to the games of the club management." At Vasco he was succeeded in 1958 by Francisco de Souza Ferreira "Gradim" who brought new success to the club, winning both, the Rio-São Paulo and the state title.
During his time in Rio de Janeiro he also coached the selection of the Federal District, which the city of Rio then constituted. Rio was a finalist in the national championship in 1954 and 1956. Ahead of the 1957 South American Championship Martim Francisco was discussed as potential coach of the Brazilian national side, a job Osvaldo Brandão eventually would obtain with Vicente Feola as his assistant.Candidata-se Martim Francisco: Quer Ser o Técnico da Seleção Nacional, Diário da Noite, Rio de Janeiro, 19 February 1957, p. 10.
1958 Martim Francisco started with SC Internacional in Porto Alegre, taking the club to the second place in the metropolitan championship, behind arch-rivals Grêmio FBPA.
Mid year Martim Francisco followed an offer to join Athletic Bilbao, the Spanish Champions of 1956. In the ensuing two seasons he led the team around star defender Jesús Garay to two third places in the league and into the semifinals of the Spanish Cup, the Copa del Rey of 1960, losing there after a 3–0 home win spectacularly in the second leg with 1-8 to Real Madrid. Around Christmas 1960 Bilbao – then in 7th place, the same rank it would finish under the new coach Juan Antonio Ipiña – let him go. The team's performances were also marred by injury problems in that period.
Return to Brazil and again to Spain: 1961 - 1967
Already in the first days of February he signed again with CR Vasco da Gama, for a reported monthly fee of 150,000 cruzeiros ()The newspaper that reported the salary on 25 July 1961, Diário de Notícias, Rio de Janeiro, cost 10 cruzeiros. until February 1962. Only three days later the club hosted Real Madrid in the Maracanã which just had defeated opposition in Chile Argentina and Chile 6–2 and 9–0. Thus, a 2–2 draw was considered a success, unlike the campaign of the club, with Bellini as the last reminder of more glorious days, in the Torneio Rio-São Paulo in March and April, where Vasco finished third, behind cross-town rivals Flamengo and Botafogo. From May until early July Vasco toured Europe, winning 12 of their 14 matches against largely second rate opposition, only losing to FC Porto.Jogos de 1961, NetVasco (per 10 Feb. 2014). By mid July Martim Francisco announced his premature resignation, some indemnity payment to Vasco for the rest of his contract was worked out. Eli do Amparo, a star-player of the Expresso da Vitória era, succeeded him, but was replaced by September with the more experienced Paulo Amaral. Vasco would not win another title before 1966, when it won the Rio-São Paulo. The next state title even had to wait until 1970.
São Paulo side SC Corinthians Paulista hired him for a reported signing-on fee of 1.1 million plus a monthly salary of 110,000 cruzeirosDiário de Notícias, Rio de Janeiro, 27 July 1961, p. 7. as successor to Alfredo Ramos, who alongside José Castelli "Rato", another former Corinthians player, became part of his coaching staff. Corinthians achieved midfield placings in the 1961 State Championship and the Rio-São Paulo Tournament of 1962. In his tenure fell the second highest defeat ever of the club, a 0–7 against Portuguesa.The highest ever defeat of Corinthians was a 0–8 against Palestra Itália, today's SE Palmeiras, on 5 November 1933. After his farewell from the club in March 1962 there were rumours that he would guide Spain through the World Cup which was to take place in Chile in May and June. He was also talked about as potential coach of FC Barcelona and FC Porto, or as successor of Aymore Moreira at São Paulo FC who went on to take the coaching job of Brazil for the World Cup. Eventually, in May he took on a job with hinterland Club Comercial FC of Ribeirão Preto which by the end of the year would finish 9th out of the 16 sides taking part in the São Paulo Championship.