He Atlético Mineiro announced this Sunday as new coach Alexi Stival ‘Cuca’, who will replace the Argentine Gabriel Milito, fired after the defeat against Botafogo in the final of the Libertadores Cup.
“The most victorious coach in the club’s history is back,” Atlético Mineiro published on its social networks, alluding to the other three times that Cuca was in charge of the team, with which in 2021 he won the Brazilian league, the Copa do Brasil and the Minas Gerais championship, which he had previously achieved in 2012 and 2013, and the Copa Libertadores, also in 2013.
In recent times, Cuca, 61 years old and one of the most recognized technicians in Brazilian footballhas had various problems due to a conviction for a rape that occurred in 1989 that was against him in the Swiss justice system.
The incident occurred in 1987, when Cuca was a player for the Guild and in the middle of a team tour of Europe. At the end of 2023, a Swiss court annulled the sentence due to procedural errors, but the coach has been the subject of protests from fans, and especially from feminist groupswhere it has passed.
In 2021, these pressures led him to resign from the Corinthians a week after being hired. In March of this year he assumed the reins of the Atlhetico Paranaense and remained in charge of the team until June, when he was fired due to the team’s poor results, which ultimately ended up falling to Second Division in full celebration of its centenary.
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Cuca began his coaching career in 1998 and since then he has coached around twenty Brazilian teams, including some of the most important, such as Flamengo, Fluminense, Vasco da Gama, Palmeiras, São Paulo, Corinthians, Cruzeiro and Santosamong others.
