Henrique Poppe Leão
Early in the 20th Century, three young men from São Paulo who had recently arrived in Porto Alegre wanted to play soccer. But were not admitted at any club in town, because they were newcomers in Porto Alegre so they decided to found their own club. On the night of Monday, April 4, 1909, in the basement of a house, and driven by three man (brothers Henrique and José Poppe Leão, and Luiz Madeira Poppe) 40 young men (twice more people than expected to attend the reunion) founded Sport Club Internacional. On the foundation minute, it was stated that the new club would not accept race, religion or economical discrimination. The most popular soccer club in Rio Grande do Sul was born there.
The Gigante da Beira-Rio stadium, the home of Internacional, was inaugurated on a clear afternoon of Sunday, April 6, 1969 with the Internacional 2-1 victory against Benfica of Portugal. Inter supporters collaborated as they could to build the stadium, like as bringing cement, nail boxes, iron bars or some bricks. The people's effort helped a lot for the construction of the imponent Gigante da Beira-Rio. In early times, the stadium has capacity for more than 90,000 spectators, and now, with the modern regulations by FIFA, the correct capacity is about 56,000 supporters.
Inter has not only a great stadium, but also owns the Beira-Rio Sportive Complex, including auxiliary training fields, Gigantinho Sportive Gymnsasium and the Nautical Complex. A few soccer clubes in the world have such a great privilege: all teams from every categories work together and players have close relationships with their professional superstars and idols since the youth divisions.
The Gigante complex has restaurants, headquarters for players, physical training rooms, shops, museum, rooms for the Directors Board, management, marketing, telephony, parking and bank. It also has the most beautiful dressing room of the Brazil, one of the most complete and luxurious in the world, inaugurated in 2004. Gigantinho is the largest sportive gymnasium owned by a club in the country, having 18,000 people capacity and perfect safety, acoustical and luminosity conditions for all kind of events, like music shows or public concurses.
In 1975, Internacional was the first club of Rio Grande do Sul to win the Brazilian Championship, making the state soccer to overpass the frontiers with a historical 1-0 victory against Cruzeiro from Minas Gerais. Where? At the Gigante da Beira-Rio, of course. It was also at Beira-Rio stadium that Inter became two-times brazilian champions, in 1976 against
Corinthians, winning by 2-0 goal margin. And, in 1979, Internacional becomes the first and only club ever to win the Brazilian Championship without a single defeat at all campaign, with the last game against Vasco da Game by 2-1 score. And, as expected, the title of Brazilian Cup against Fluminense in 1992 was again at Beira-Rio stadium, by the smallest margin 1-0.
Sport Club International has one of the best structures for the formation of Brazilian soccer young talents. It offers a complete infrastructure for the development of soccer players ranging from 7 to 20 years old. Today it has about 1.120 boys in soccer pratice, 320 of them engaged in championships teams and the others playing soccer for pleausure at the
youngest teams. The club also offer to these boys: coaches, physiotherapists, psychologists, social workers, doctors, nutritionists and dental care.
Having invested a lot in youth teams, Inter has developed an overwhelming numbers of aces athlets in all of this 95 years. Some of the greatest soccer players on Earth started playing at Sport Club Internacional. Players like Paulo Roberto Falcão, who starred at World Cup 1982, goalkeeper Taffarel, decisive in title campaign of World Cup 1994, and midfielder Dunga, the brazilian skipper who received the champions trophy at the same tournament. Anothers players who enjoyed large success in world football was the centre-back Lúcio, world champion in World Cup 2002, defender Aloísio, who played at Barcelona and Porto at 90's, midfielder Batista, who played in World Cup 1982, and the central midfielder Fábio Rochemback, now playing at Sporting Lisbon.
Sport Club Internacional
Av. Padre Cacique, 891 - CEP: 90810-240 - Porto Alegre - RS
Fone: (51)3230 4600
