Fifteen Minutes with Givanildo

Givanildo Oliveira is a figure defined by a long career and a public image strongly associated with candor, simplicity and Northeastern identity. The challenge of the interview was to go beyond a conventional career retrospective and, within limited space, build a portrait showing how those personal traits connected to his path through Brazilian football.

The conversation also created room for broader issues in the national game: the historical difficulty faced by Northeastern coaches in reaching certain markets, the relationship with the press, experiences at major clubs in Brazil's South and Southeast, and the ways recognition and regional prejudice intersect with a career built across different contexts.

I structured the piece with a short profile-style opening that introduces Givanildo through the combination of career, personality and regional belonging before moving into a question-and-answer format. The interview moves through key moments in his career and uses those experiences as a starting point for subjects that go beyond sporting performance.

Throughout the conversation, Givanildo discusses Santa Cruz, Corinthians, Fluminense, the Brazilian national team, his work as a coach and his Northeastern identity. The format preserves his direct voice and lets the answers build the character, while the introduction gives readers an editorial frame connecting career and context.

The result is an interview that works both as a character profile and as a record of broader structural themes in Brazilian football. By placing Givanildo's career in dialogue with regional identity, professional recognition and movement across different football markets in the country, the piece goes beyond a strictly factual sports interview.

Within my portfolio, the work is important because it demonstrates experience interviewing a significant figure in Brazilian football, the ability to conduct long and contextualized conversations, and publication in a nationally distributed sports magazine. It also reinforces the continuity of my football expertise throughout my career.

I was responsible for researching, preparing and conducting the interview, as well as writing the profile-style introduction and editing the final piece for publication in Revista Corner.