Note: thanks to commenter for providing helpful info on Diogo’s brother André
Diogo Jota made it to the peak of the footballing world, featuring at Wolves before moving on to Liverpool FC, while his brother André spent much of his career in Portugal:
Silva started playing football at local club Gondomar S.C. before joining Porto's youth team in 2011, staying there for six years before moving on to Pacos de Ferreira and then Famalicao's U23 side following a loan spell with Padroense.
His professional career began with Famalico, though after a brief spell he joined Boavista U23s on a free transfer, spending one season there before returning to Gondomar in the summer of 2021.
Diogo recently celebrated a Premier League title before marrying his longtime girlfriend Rute Cardoso less than 2 weeks ago.
And just like that, in the blink of an eye, they have been taken from their family, friends, and teammates. The details, such as they are known, is that they were involved in a car crash, their Lamborghini apparently blowing out a tire, resulting in a horrific accident.
When I saw the headlines indicating remembrances of Diogo’s time at Liverpool, my first thought was that he had agreed to a transfer. He’d had poor luck with injuries over recent years, and it wasn’t unreasonable to think Liverpool were open to a transfer should the right opportunity present itself. As I read up, though, I realized this wasn’t the case at all, and my heart sank.
Diogo was of course ‘a poacher’ in the nomenclature of football. He was a guy who’d get to where the ball was headed and with a quick strike place the ball in the back of the net. He was the footballing personification of the great Wayne Gretzky quote: a good player goes to where the ball is, a great player goes to where it’s going to be.
A magician with the ball at his feet in the penalty area, Jota would ghost through attempts to defend him before ultimately defeating the goalkeeper. His strikes, skilled in the art of deception, were all the more impressive with the benefit of slow motion replay. How’d he do that? you’d think, watching the keeper get wrong-footed, helplessly watching the ball cross his goal line for the score.
He found a perfect home on Merseyside, overlapping the late stages of the Roberto Firmino era, a #9 who was most effective as a heavy presence on the high press and at delivering the ball to two of the most devastating finishers of that era: Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mané. Diogo was more your classic #9, the guy who needed to be delivered the ball in the attacking third, but who was more likely to call his own number and score than serve as the set up man. His ability to finish quickly made him a fan favorite at Anfield.
The awful news of his death follows the car crash that took place during Liverpool FC’s parade to celebrate their 20th league title in late May. Fortunately there were no fatalities in that crash, but of course dozens of people will have a long road to recovery. All of those injured in the parade crash have left the hospital, which is a nice bit of good news.
Rest in peace, Diogo.
Mate, wrong André Silva.