From poverty to politics, the career of Benfica’s beloved goalkeeper Manuel Bento

How can you become one of the best goalkeepers in the world at a height of just 173cm (5’7’’)? Nowadays, when we look at goalkeepers, it’s difficult not to be impressed with the height and size of many of the game’s top players in this position. In a sense, it was always a little bit like that.

That only makes Manuel Bento’s career as an elite footballer even more remarkable. He was smaller than many on-field players, yet few can claim to have been as successful, respected and beloved as the goalkeeper who spent more than a decade at a club where the only option was to win every week. Bento was a symbol of the last golden age of Benfica but also of a Portugal that was changing as a nation. 

Hirsute look

Manuel Galrinho Bento was one of a kind.

His looks, heavy moustache and curly hair afforded him an appearance you would not expect of a top-class goalkeeper. He was a small-sized player who could stretch out to become someone larger than life. On and off the pitch. Born in the abandoned Portuguese interior, in Golegã, near the Tagus river and not far from the well-known Fátima sanctuary, Bento was a person who used to perform miracles at an astonishing rate. None more so than during his humble beginnings.

His poor family background seemingly condemned him to an impoverished existence as a stone mason. Working from a tender age to help out at home, Bento knew life was going to be a hard experience right from the start. He was committed to learning his trade and getting on with it, as people did, but at the same time, the love for football was always there. In the 1950s, when he was still a child, the duels between SL Benfica and Sporting became more intense as the Eagles were starting to develop the professional structure under the guidance of Otto Gloria that would eventually lead them to topple the Lions at the top of the national football pyramid.

Sporting miss out

Little did he know then that his exploits at the unknown Riachense and Goleganense would catch the eye of Sporting’s scouts in the Santarém region. Still a teenager, he was sent for a trial that didn’t turn out well. For Sporting, at least. By that time, in 1968, Benfica were already reigning supreme, and at 20 years of age Bento became aware that he was skilful enough as a goalkeeper to try and join a football club that would allow him to play at the highest level. A scout from Barreirense knew all about the trial he had had with Sporting and his previous exploits, so the club from the south bank of Lisbon’s River Tagus approached him to join the ranks.

At that time football in Portugal was essentially a sport dominated by the Lisbon clubs and their rivals on the other side of the river, while Porto was having a tough desert crossing and the Minho region was still fairly underdeveloped. Both Vitória FC and CUF were the powerhouses south of Lisbon, difficult opponents for the likes of Benfica, Sporting and Belenenses.

At home in humble surroundings

The small local industry that spread from Montijo to Almada helped to expand small communities such as Seixal, Amora and Barreiro. The factories, shipyards and fields around it provided job opportunities for the poorer who flocked from the neighbouring Alentejo or Beiras regions, trying to escape hunger and the need to leave the country in search of greener pastures. Bento would fit right in that world, having come from such a humble background. In fact, he would not only fit, but he would become a symbol of the South Bank’s sporting culture for generations.

He had his first season with the red and white colours of Barreirense – ironically enough the local rivals of the Barreiro club, the company-owned CUF, wore the green and white, marking the colourful rivalry he would have with Sporting in the years to come as a Benfica player – in 1968/69 and immediately became the team’s stand-out player. However, poor results caused Barreirense to end up rock bottom, the side falling into the second tier, which they won fairly easily the following season.

Fan favourite

Back in the elite came the breakthrough moments in Bento’s career. Many were suspicious already of his small height but he became a crowd favourite due to his incredible saves that had the club finish fourth, their best-ever league table position, five points ahead of local rivals CUF. That also meant European football for the relatively unknown club and in their first continental match, against a much-fancied Dinamo Zagreb side, Barreirense came out on top, 2-0, with Bento once again performing wonders against a team that included several Yugoslav internationals who had played in the Euro 1968 final against the hosts Italy. Sadly, despite an early goal, Barreirense couldn’t hold their nerve at the crowded Maksimir and were beaten by the Croatians fair and square.

They finished the season near the drop zone but Portuguese football already knew what their star goalkeeper was all about. A season onward Benfica decided to move for his signing so that he could compete against José Henrique – popularly known as Zé Gato because of his feline movements – for the Águias goal-tender position. Few expected Bento to have such an immediate impact as he was viewed as one for the future. He wasn’t.

Quick to make his mark

For three years he menaced Henrique’s starting position by playing more than 15 matches per season and by 1976 he was the undisputed number one. Not only of Benfica but of the national team as well. The rivalry with Sporting icon Vitor Damas prolonged for a decade, as the two were remarkable goalkeepers, albeit with different styles and personalities. It was one of the toughest calls for any Portugal manager to make but it didn’t help either that, for that particular generation, things didn’t seem to work out at international level. 

The Seleção had surprised everyone at the 1966 World Cup, but for the following 18 years Portugal went nowhere and that included both Damas and Bento’s best professional seasons. At club level they also suffered from the loss of relevance of the Portuguese league, once one of the most popular in the 1960s. No club played any major finals during the 1970s as Portugal, suffering from a trend that included other southern European nations, was surpassed by the physicality and tactical revolution that came from northern countries such as the Netherlands, Germany and the United Kingdom.

Penalty heroics

The glorious European nights of the Estádio da Luz that Bento knew from the radio broadcasts during his teens were no more and Benfica had to be content with establishing their domestic dominance throughout the decade. Even so, some moments couldn’t be forgotten such as the night the Golegã-born keeper stopped two penalties and scored the winner in a shootout against Torpedo Moscow in the early rounds of the European Cup in 1977. If only there were more nights like that probably Bento would have been more well-known and respected outside of Portugal, at a time when you had to shine on the big stage to be lauded.

What Bento did differently was to imprint a more popular ethos on the Benfica dressing room. As the golden days of Eusébio and the African players brought from the occupied colonies of Mozambique or Angola reached their end, the club was forced to look elsewhere for talented and skilled players. They didn’t have to look much further down the river. Around Barreiro and the South Bank, several classy footballers were starting to get more attention as time went by and soon enough Benfica – and Sporting, as well – picked them up one by one.

Left-wing, community-based and politically aware 

Benfica set their eyes on the likes of Fernando Chalana, Jorge Silva, José Luis, Carlos Manuel and Diamantino who were gradually signed and became key figures for the club over the following decades. They didn’t bring only their football skills. Barreiro, like the whole South Bank region, had been known for years to be the stronghold of the Portuguese Communist Party as well as other left-wing groups during the dictatorship years. Those who were born or raised there were fed, from a tender age, a very strong communal and hardworking spirit, outspoken and conscientious of their role in society. Bento became a sort of father figure for those signings and, at a time when players usually crossed the Tagus on a boat to train daily, he used his van – part of his fish retail store – to pick them up one by one at their places so they would drive together.

Eventually, they would all grow their hair and beards the same way as they sported the same values and principles that fitted with a nation that was starting to slowly blossom after the Carnation Revolution. For those brought up in the area, football was perceived differently from the players that came from the former colonies of Africa or even from other parts of Portugal, and they elevated the social identity and consciousness of Benfica as the people’s club. Later in his career that outspoken spirit would bring some, including Bento, into conflict with the football authorities. Back in the mid-70s they became examples to follow for anyone who loved the game expressed in an environment of political freedom.

Bouncing back to prominence

What the Carnation Revolution also brought back was FC Porto’s rivalry with Benfica as José Maria Pedroto – the man who gave Bento his Portugal debut – revamped the club and quickly started to challenge the Águias for honours. The back-to-back title wins for Porto followed by a successful year for Sporting seemed to condemn that Benfica generation in the eyes of supporters and many expected some key players to step aside for a much-needed refresh of the squad. Bento was not at his best in the late 1970s and his nerves got the better of him when, during a derby against Sporting, he violently attacked Manuel Fernandes after the players collided. Red-carded and later suspended, many believed his time was up but they were in for a surprise.

The arrival of Sven-Goren Eriksson at Benfica and the surprising successful qualifications for Euro 84 and the 1986 World Cup changed everything. First, it was the Swede who made it clear that Bento would be his standout goalkeeper and the stopper enjoyed some of his best professional seasons under Eriksson. The memorable European campaign in the 1982/83 UEFA Cup, particularly against AS Roma, is well alive in the hearts of Benfica supporters even forty years on. That became one of the best Benfica teams of all time and Bento proved once again to be decisive in key moments of the back-to-back league title-winning campaigns, playing his only European final as well in 1983.

Prevailing despite squad schism

At the same time, and against all odds, Portugal managed to qualify for their first international tournament in almost two decades. The spirit of warfare between north and south when it came to football had been a rotten influence on the game in Portugal over the previous seasons and the rivalry between FC Porto’s international players and their Lisbon counterparts was at an all-time high. Several squad members from opposing sides of the barricades would not even talk to each another and when the Brazilian Otto Gloria resigned as national coach, many expected Portugal to flounder once again in their qualifying campaign for the European Championship hosted in France in June of the following year. Incredibly, the players managed to turn things around and thanks to a brilliant Bento afternoon and a penalty that wasn’t so in the last match against the Soviet Union, Portugal did just that.

However, more tension followed as the Portuguese Football Federation in their infinite wisdom decided to nominate a technical panel comprising of representatives from the Big Three – assistant managers from all three clubs – for Euro 1984, the first major tournament Portugal were competing in since the 1966 World Cup and only their second ever. The selection policy had as many political factors as football ones, and it was even decided how many players from each club side should be on the playing field for every match to keep everyone happy. It had the opposite effect, despite Bento serving as skipper and trying to build bridges, but once again, remarkably, Portugal did go through from the group stage against Spain, Romania and West Germany to pitch themselves in the semis versus the host nation in Marseille.

That night in Marseille

It would become one of the most lauded and rewatched football matches in Portuguese history and Bento immediately became an icon for everyone watching at home all over Europe. His dazzling skills allowed Portugal to turn around an early French goal to force extra time then take the lead, and even if the hosts eventually won it in the dying seconds of the match, Bento had done the impossible to keep the score as it was. The “rubber man” tag from the British press from years before, after a match against Scotland, made sense once again.

Portugal were out of the tournament but then qualified again for the 1986 World Cup against all odds. This time the players decided to stick together but arrived in Mexico to find appalling circumstances that they were quick to publicly denounce. The Football Federation had splashed their budget on key institutional figures and sponsors who stayed in Mexico City while the squad was forced to move to Saltillo, sleep in a highway hotel, without a pitch to practice on or teams to play against in friendlies.

On strike in Mexico

When the players found out that the Portuguese football authorities were planning to keep all the sponsor’s money for themselves, the old Barreiro left-wing ethos was brought back to life by Bento and many of the internationals and the squad went on strike. The issue was even raised in the Portuguese Parliament, but the Carnation Revolution had been twelve years before and many had embraced different political views and policies.

The players were deemed as irresponsible brats as well as dangerous revolutionaries and despite ending the strike, and beating England in their first match, it all went sideways when, during the following practice, Bento suffered a career-end injury. There was no backup plan as Damas, his understudy, hadn’t played competitive football for a while and was unable to perform as Portugal was beaten by Poland and Morocco and sent home after just three matches.

On their return, many internationals were suspended for life from the national side and Bento, as the leader of the pack, was one of the most attacked players of the group. It didn’t affect the end of his career because the ill-fated injury had already seen to that. He remained in the Benfica squad for the following four seasons but played only a handful of matches in that period. His leadership skills and cultural impact, however, saw the club offer him a place as goalkeeper trainer from his official retirement onwards, even if he briefly tried to coach outside of da Luz, with no great success.

Untimely death

Bento died very young, at 58 years of age, in the same Barreiro that had welcomed him as a teenager and where he is still revered as a local icon. He didn’t live long enough to see the renaissance of his Benfica side, after the disturbing Vietnam years that followed the 1994 title-winning season under the guidance of his friend Toni. By that time Vitor Baía had already surpassed him in international caps and recognition as Portugal’s greatest ever, but many do still believe that the former Benfica legend still ranks as Portugal’s number one in history.

In a country full of celebrated goalkeepers ever since António Roquette in the late 1920s up to Diogo Costa, it will always be a hard choice to make, but it is undeniable that Bento has become synonymous with style, skill and iconic performances. Benfica never had a goalkeeper like him before and they probably never will despite the likes of Michel Preud’homme, Jan Oblak or Ederson following in his footsteps.

That’s how big of a shadow he has cast with time for anyone who pulls on the club’s jersey, gloves and stands between the sticks. More than a player, Manuel Galrinho Bento was an institution.

By Miguel Lourenço Pereria, author of “Bring Me That Horizon – A Journey to the Soul of Portuguese Football”.