Gomes began playing football as a centerforward. He only accepted playing keeper in order not be left out of a sand football tournament. He never again left the position.
Gomes walked 6km everyday to get to training. The player lived in the countryside and had to walk to the Democrata’s training grounds in Sete Lagoas, Minas Gerais.
When he played on the Minas Gerais Democrata team, Gomes was responsible for the kitchen of the club’s training camp. He would buy rolls of bread, butter them and distribute them among the rest of the boys on the squad.
On October 25, 2006, Gomes reached the mark of 40 games without taking a single goal in official games with PSV in the Dutch Championship out of 70 games played.
Beginnings
His poor childhood in the small Minas Gerais town of Três Marias did not dampen the enthusiam of the young Heurelho da Silva Gomes from starting a career in football. At the age of 14, the player began as a centerforward on a local team.
In the neighboring Sete Lagoas, in a football tournament played on sand, Gomes was signed up as a goalkeeper, since it was the only position open on the team, and he never again left that position. The young defender, 17 years old at the time, was chosen Most Valuable Player of the championship, and also got the opportunity to train at the Cruzeiro football school, one of the main training camps in the State.
After a year at the school, he got a chance to show his football skills for the first time in the Minas Gerais State Tournament. First in the youth category, then in the Third Division, both wearing the jersey of the Democrata of Sete Lagoas team.
At the end of 1998, Gomes left Minas Gerais football for the first time to wear the jerseys of CRB in Alagoas and Guarani in São Paulo. These stints, however, were very short-lived and in 2000 the player arrived at Toca da Raposa, literally “the Fox’s Den” the name of Cruzeiro Club’s training ground. On the Cruzeiro youth team, the goalkeeper had, for the first time in his career, the necessary training structure to develop his technique in the position.
Cruzeiro
In the 2002 São Paulo Juniors Cup, he was a reserve player of Cruzeiro team and, with his performance shown in training and in the games he played, he had the opportunity to move up to the professional team. Initially, as the third goalkeeper, but with the structure of working with a first-rate national football team.
Gradually, he gained the confidence of Vanderlei Luxemburgo, Cruzeiro’s coach at the time, and by the end of the season, he was the starting goalkeeper after a series of bad performances by the other keeper.
After four games in the position, Gomes developed a problem with his meniscus which left him out for 25 days. Despite this, coach Luxemburgo was determined to be patient with his keeper, who returned as the starting goalkeeper of the team.
2003 was the year when Gomes proved himself with the team of Minas Gerais. With the Cruzeiro team, the goalkeeper raised victory trophies for the State Championship Cup, the Brazilian Championship and the Cup of Brazil. His performances gained the player a place on the Brazilian National team during the Pre-Olympics in Chile at the beginning of 2004.
During the new season, speculation about the interests of foreign clubs in Gomes’s talent began. PSV Eindhoven, of the Netherlands, was the first to show up with an offer at Toca da Raposa, but the Cruzeiro Club’s managers were initially not interested in discussing the issue.
On Cruzeiro’s last game in the Libertatores da America Cup of that year, Gomes suffered a bone fracture on his hand. Football critics believed that the injury could threaten the player’s future.
PSV
But the problem has not dashed Gomes’s enthusiam, who in two months was recovered and finally found Cruzeiro negotiating his transfer rights with PSV, a club that was putting together its team for the 2004-2005 European season.
In the Netherlands, Gomes suffered from prejudice because he was Brazilian, a country famous for its attackers but not defensive players. But Gomes showed his potential on the field and gradually he won over PSV’s fans and even rivals.
Gomes went on to become one of the goalkeepers with the greatest records in the Netherlands and found himself a place on the Brazilian National team since the beginning of the Dunga period, after the 2006 World Cup. One of his dreams is to defend for Brazil in the World Cup.
At PSV, the Brazilian won four championship titles and was awarded the Silver Ball in the 2007-2008 season, a award given to the best in the competition.
Tottenham
With enviable achievements, Gomes’s transfer was negotiated to Tottenham, an English club of great tradition, where he intends to continue setting records and winning titles.
His contract is valid through June 2012, where it can be extended for 2 more years, when the goalkeeper will be 33.