Klovis Akosta Fernandes is a legendary fan of the Brazilian national soccer team. The man followed his favorite team everywhere, visiting more than 150 soccer matches in 60 countries. Klovis attended 6 World Cups, 6 Cups of South America, 4 Confederation Cups and also soccer games at the Olympics.
Klovis’s love for soccer and the Brazilian national team was instilled in him by his father. When Klovis was little, his father ran fireworks on their backyard to commemorate the victory of the Brazilian team in 1958 and 1962.
In 1970, when the young Klovis was watching the world championship on television, he got a dream to visit this grand event and cheer for his favorite team from the stadium stands.
These are Klovis Fernandes and his wife Deborah.
The only thing that brought Klovis more joy than Brazil’s victory in the World Cup was the birth of his children.
Until 1990 Klovis had a normal lifestyle raising 4 children. He owned a small pizzeria, working there all day every day and forgetting about vacation. A few months before the World Cup 1990 in Italy, Klovis decided to fulfill his dream.
Klovis sold the pizzeria. On that money he bought his wife a piano, which she had long dreamed of, and received her permission to go to Italy.
Klovis wanted to realize his dream, plunge into the world of soccer and support his favorite team. He lived in Italy for a month, while the World Cup was going on. During this time he managed to earn some money by working part time at one of the local pizzerias.
At that world championship Brazil lost to Argentina and withdrew from 1/8 finals. However, this did not affect the mood of Klovis, he returned home being a completely different person: he craved traveling and new impressions. His wife and his adult children understood and supported his enthusiasm.
In 1994 Klovis with his son went to America for the World Cup. Brazil won, and a small support group led by Fernandes was named Gaucho da Copa (Cowboy of Cup). All Brisilian newspapers were writing about this active group of soccer fans. After that “Cowboy of Cup” got its sponsors that helped them to travel with their favorite team.
This is photo of Fernandes and his granddaughter after the loss of Brazil at the 2014 World Cup. In this game the favorite Klovis team brought him the biggest disappointment, losing in the semifinals to Germany with the score of 1:7. Klovis could not hold back his tears. The photo of him with the cup near his chest was published in all the world’s media.
After the 2014 World Cup, Klovis graciously gives the cup to the fan of the German national team.
Many people did not know that the cheerful Klovis was struggling with cancer for 9 years. Klovis believed that his favorite Brazilian team would win the World Cup 2018 in Russia. But he could not fly to Russia for the World Cup.
Almost a decade this Brazilian fan was fighting with kidney cancer, while continuing to travel and cheer for his team. Even being chained to a bed, he was happy and infected peope surrounding him with a positive mood.
In August 2015 Fernandez refused to do the next course of chemotherapy, making a decision to spend the last weeks of his life with his big friendly family.
These are Gostavo and Franco, the sons of Klovis, at the 2018 World Cup in Russia, but without their father.
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