There are not many footballers who can say that they have won a league championship in almost half the world. The former player of Atlético de Madrid and the Inter de Milan among others, Joao miranda, It is one of them. And it is that at 36 years old, he can boast of being a League champion on three different continents: America, Europe and Asia.
Just over a year ago, the experienced Brazilian central defender embarked on a new adventure by going to China to play in the Jiangsu Suning and in his second season with the whole city of Nánjing, about 300 kilometers from Shanghai, he was proclaimed this Thursday champion of the Chinese Super League. A title that was also historic for his club, which dethroned Guangzhou Evergrande by prevailing in the second leg of the final (2-1) after the first leg ended 0-0 and won its first championship in its 26 years of life. .
Quite an achievement, and more if one takes into account that the Guangzhou Evergrande had won 8 of the last 9 leagues of the Asian giant, it will also allow the Jiangsu Suning Get a place in the new FIFA Club World Cup. Without a doubt, Miranda has been one of the mainstays in the team that Cosmin Olaroiu coaches, which also has in its ranks another footballer with a past in the Spanish league, such as Wakaso Mubarak, former player of Spanish, Villarreal and Elche, and that with 30 years, he has won his second league title, after the one he achieved with the Celtic in 2015.
Much younger was Miranda when he first experienced the sensation of winning a league. He did it in his native country with the Sao Paulo, which took the Brasileirão for three consecutive years (2006, 2007 and 2008).
With Sao Paulo, he won the league title for three consecutive years (2006-08)
Already consolidated in European football, with the Atlético de Madrid in 2014, breaking an 18-year drought, after that remembered draw against Barça on the last day of the championship in the Camp Nou (1-1). The following season, he went to Inter But in his four courses as a ‘neroazurro’ he could not break Juventus's dominance in Serie A, which he has now done in China with him. Jiangsu Suning at the expense of Paulinho's powerful Guangzhou Evergrande, directed by Fabio Cannavaro.