Leonardo Moura

Leonardo da Silva Moura is a professional football player from Brazil who plays as a defender on the right flank. Moura began his playing career with the Botafogo youth team and until 1998, was one of their squad members. However, a year earlier, Moura would make his professional debut for the first team, getting a call-up to play for them. Between 1997 and 1999, Moura spent a lot of his time playing with the reserve team before moving to Linhares Esporte Clube.

Before playing a single game for the team, Moura moved to Belgium and signed up with Germinal Beerschot in 1999. He stayed at the club for two seasons, playing 21 games before moving to ADO Den Haag in the Dutch second division. This is the time in his career when Moura made the shift from being a midfielder to being a right full-back. In his 29 games for the club, Moura scored 12 goals and decided to return to Botafogo to give his Brazilian career another shot.

2001 was more consistent for Moura who played over 20 games for Botafogo, scoring once, but not performing well enough to deserve a contract extension. He suffered an injury that kept him out for a part of the season, also the reason behind this decision by the club. Moura ended up moving to another big Rio de Janeiro club, Vasco da Gama.

After a good season in the state league, with Vasco da Gama, Moura moved to Palmeiras but the team ended up getting relegated at the end of the season and Moura called it the worst move of his life. He had only played 9 games for the team, before being forced to move to Sao Paulo.

Playing 22 games throughout 2003, with Sao Paulo, Moura needed to find a new challenge and Fluminense is where he ended up. He signed with the club in 2004 and 41 games later, moved to Portugal to play with SC Braga. However, his European run lasted just 8 games and Moura was back in Brazil, signing a deal with Flamengo in 2005.

Finally, Moura had arrived at that time of his career when things would start to work out for him and that meant titles would come his way. He began by helping Flamengo win the Copa do Brasil title in 2006 as well as the 2007, 2008 and 2011 Taca Guanabara titles. Flamengo also won the 2009 and 2011 Taca Rio titles with Moura in their ranks, as well as the 2008, 2008, 2009 and 2011 Rio de Janeiro State League titles.

In 2009, Moura helped his team win the big title – the 2009 Serie A championships. On an individual level, Moura went on to win the best right back of the year award for Serie A in 2007 and was named to the best eleven, for the Serie A, in 2007 and 2008. The current vice-captain of the Flamengo squad has also won a cap for the Brazilian national team in 2009 but the presence of a certain Dani Alves has meant that opportunities have been few and far in between. He has, however, played almost 230 games for Flamengo, scoring 26 times.