Whatever the distance, Jota was always at hand.
“He never changed his phone number after leaving Pacos. He didn’t need it. He always answered when people called,” said former club president Paulo Menesses.
“Sometimes, tragic circumstances like hers can make us too generous in the way we talk about those who have passed. But this was not the case with him. He really had two essential qualities in a person – humility and gratitude – and in him, they were undeniable.
“The last time we were promoted to the elite in 2018-2019, he sent me a message, humbly asking if he could come to watch. Then, the day we won the title of the League, he sent me a message five seconds after the end of the match, saying:” We did it again “. He was someone who knew his origins.”
None of this will surprise those who have shared a wardrobe with him.
The former goalkeeper of Liverpool and now Brentford, Caoimhin Kelleher, recalled how they would meet to follow the Portuguese lower levels.
“You have become one of my friends closest to football. We have linked to everything related to sport, watching any football match that we could find – often your brother Andre’s games on your iPad,” Kelleher wrote on social networks.
It seems almost contradictory that someone so deeply connected to their education can still adapt so transparent to wherever it was going – whether Gondomar, Pacos, Porto, Wolverhampton or Liverpool.
“He was the most British foreign player I have ever met,” said Liverpool’s left back Andy Robertson. “We used to joke, he was really Irish … I would try to claim him as a Scottish, of course. I even called him Diogo Macjota.
“We looked at the darts together, take advantage of horse races. Going to Cheltenham this season was a highlight – one of the best moments we had.”
No matter to Jota that he had an academy named after him at home. Nor that a stand was built thanks to its transfer. Or even he scored goals in the Champions League.
He was still the same guy who had overcome the chances of becoming a footballer.
“He was an incredible young man – a strong personality, a great character and extremely competitive, always with a burning desire to win. But more than anything, he appreciated honesty, people respected heteros with him and had little time for those who beat the bush,” said Seabra.
It was a football superstar who knew that he would not have reached the heights that he reached without the help of the Teresas along the way.
