For me, one team that sums up the World Cup has to be Brazil. Like countless of other generations of football followers I fell in love with the football of that country whilst watching them play in the tournament.

Mexico 1970 started the love affair. In searing temperatures, high above sea level, they played a brand of football I had never seen and soon the names of players that made up that team became players I pretended to be when out playing football on a patch of wasteland on a council estate in Peckham.

I think I knew even then at that tender age, that I was not good enough to pretend to be Pele. I mean, sometimes you have got to be honest with yourself. In a 30 a side game aged 7 or 8, if you said ‘I’m going to be Pele today’, you just knew you would get laughed at. So, no I ‘became’ Rivellino. He was the heavy moustached attacking midfielder who seemed to stroll through a game, nonchalantly passing the ball with either foot and who would then step up every now and then and crack in a banana shaped free kick that flew into a top corner. I spent hours trying to curl the ball like he did.

There was one game that sealed my total admiration for Brazil and somewhat ironically it came at the expense of my own country. Yes it was that classic group stage encounter, which had me as 8-year-old boy, and most of the population of England, glued to the action from Guadalajara in the searing midday heat.

This game had the lot. There was that quite remarkable save from Gordon Banks from the Pele downward bullet header that had GOAL written all over it, only to see Banks somehow get to it and flick it over the bar. We also had THAT tackle from Bobby Moore on Jairzinho. The Brazilian winger was in full flight, a simply magnificent sight and he was bearing down on Bobby. Calmly however, the England captain perfectly timed taking the ball from the attackers foot and then calmly and simply plays the ball forward like it was kick about in the park. To this day, when watched back, that is a thing of beauty. Then there was the miss from Jeff Astle, on as a sub. The miss would be something old Jeff would be reminded of for years to come. Finally the Brazilian goal. Tostao wriggles past a couple of our defenders, then spins and plays a ball into Pele, who instantly kills the bounce and lays off a lovely ball into the stride of Jairzinho to fire home.

It was simply a great game. At the end Pele and Booby Moore exchange shirts and the respect from each to the other is there for all to see.

Just thinking about that game, the names come flooding back. Carlos Alberto, Tostao, my man Rivellino, Gerson, Jairzinho and of course Pele all coached by Mario Zagallo. Immediately after the game, I decided I wanted a Brazilian football shirt. That didn’t go down too well with my dad after seeing his beloved England get beat.

To make matters even worse, England then lost 3-2 to West Germany in the Quarters after leading 2-0. Gordon Banks was out with food poisoning (some say he was sabotaged) and Ramsey took Bobby Charlton off with 20 minutes to go to save his legs for the semi final. Charlton said later that he felt fine and could have run all day.

Oh Alf…

We should have won it and if we had, well it was thought we had a good chance to have beaten the Italians in the Semis and then faced Brazil again, in the final.

Alas, it was not to be and it was the Italians who played Brazil in the final.

For me that game is summed up in that classic goal from the Brazilian captain Carlos Alberto. I can see it in my minds eye now as I recreated that goal, time and time again as a kid, using the sheds and garages that surrounded me as my fellow players.

Italy are on the attack in the last couple of minutes of the game, but lose the ball. He dribbles beautifully past 4 Italian players, before passing on to me, I mean, Rivellino, who in turn finds Jairzinho. He runs quickly with the ball and then passes to Pele. Pele in one movement receives the ball, looks slightly to his right sees Carlos Alberto steaming up at speed and feeds the ball perfectly into his path. Alberto without breaking stride smashes the ball into the corner of the Italian net.

Glorious.

Fast forward to 2011. Due to some graft I’m involved with, I get invited to the testimonial game for Paul Scholes that sees Manchester United take on the New York Cosmos at Old Trafford.

As part of the ticket deal, I end up at The Lowry, the same hotel as the Cosmos and it is then that I find out that Pele and Carlos Alberto are in their travelling entourage. To say I was speechless upon hearing that is an understatement.

Getting close to Pele proved very tricky as he is very much in demand, but I see the great man in the hotel and find I just stop and stare at him. All day long there is no sign of Alberto. Then just as I was going up to my room after the match a tall man is coming toward me on the stairs. He somehow drops his mobile phone. I bend down to pick it up and hand it back to him and it is then, that I suddenly become like an eight year old kid again.

Yep, you’ve guessed it; the man now thanking me for retrieving his phone is the one and only Carlos Alberto.

Reader, life is strange and at times a beautiful thing and that was definitely one of those times.