World Cup winner and Brazil stalwart Lucio has been announced as a Palmeiras player, where he has signed a deal until the end of 2015.
The 35 year-old central defender has moved across Brazil’s largest city after ending an acrimonious spell at rivals Sao Paulo. Training with the reserves for the second part of last season after a dispute with the coach about Lucio’s part in conceding a goal to Internacional, he never again played for the Tricolor.
A move to Palmeiras is unlikely to be well received by fans of his former club but a determination to leave is perhaps highlighted by taking a drop in salary to roughly a third of what he was on previously.
Lucio spent the majority of his club career in Germany with Bayer Leverkusen and Bayern Munich, with whom he claimed three Bundesliga titles; at Inter Milan the Champions League was won in 2010.
But the pinnacle of Lucio’s footballing legacy is surely the lifting of the World Cup in 2002 for a dominant Selecao. In a truly glittering career, the centre-back amassed 105 caps for Brazil, netting four times.
