José Eduardo Bischofe de Almeida or simply Zé Eduardo, also known as Zé Love (born 29 October 1987), is a Brazilian

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who plays for

Brasiliense FC Brasiliense Futebol Clube, commonly referred to as Brasiliense, is a Brazilian professional club based in Taguatinga, Distrito Federal founded on 1 August 2000. It competes in the Campeonato Brasileiro Série D, the fourth tier of Brazilian foo ...

. Zé Eduardo holds an Italian passport.

Career

Early career

Zé Eduardo started his professional career in

Palmeiras Sociedade Esportiva Palmeiras (), commonly known as Palmeiras, is a Brazilian professional football club based in the city of São Paulo, in the district of Perdizes. Palmeiras is one of the most popular clubs in South America, with around ...

. During his stay at the club, José Eduardo earned the moniker of "Zé Love" and "God of Goalscorer" in a comparison with Palmeiras' standout striker

Vagner Love Vagner or Vágner is both a masculine given name and a surname. It is a version of the Germanic surname Wagner. Notable people with the name include: Surname *Alexandru Vagner (born 1989), Romanian footballer * Ivan Vagner (born 1985), Russian engi ...

because of his "very impressive" goal scoring stats. After an unremarkable stint at the São Paulo club, Zé Eduardo played for

Portuguesa Santista Portuguesa is a Portuguese, Catalan, and Spanish feminine adjective meaning "Portuguese". It may also refer to: Places *Portuguesa (state), one of the 23 states of Venezuela * Portuguesa (Rio de Janeiro), a neighbourhood of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil ...

Atlético Paranaense Club Athletico Paranaense (commonly known as Athletico and formerly known as Atlético Paranaense) is a Brazilian football team from the city of Curitiba, capital city of the Brazilian state of Paraná, founded on March 26, 1924. The team ...

, Cruzeiro (who bought 70% of the player's economic rights for R$ 300,000),

Bragantino Red Bull Bragantino, commonly known as Bragantino, is a Brazilian football club based in Bragança Paulista, São Paulo. It competes in the Série A, the top tier of the Brazilian football league system, as well as in the Campeonato Paulista S ...

(2006

Campeonato Paulista The Campeonato Paulista Série A1, commonly known as Campeonato Paulista, nicknamed Paulistão, is the top-flight professional association football, football league in the Brazilian States of Brazil, state of São Paulo (state), São Paulo. Run b ...

), Ipatinga (April – May 2006), Villa Nova (2006

Taça Minas Gerais The Taça Minas Gerais is a traditional football tournament played in the Minas Gerais state in Brazil. From 1973 through 1977 it was played as a separate tournament, but from 1979 through 1986, it was played as one of the phases in the Campeonato M ...

Sport Sport pertains to any form of Competition, competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and Skill, skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to specta ...

(January – August 2007), Grêmio (2007 Copa FGF), Ferroviária (2008 Campeonato Paulista Série A2) and

Fortaleza Fortaleza (, locally , Portuguese for ''Fortress'') is the state capital of Ceará, located in Northeastern Brazil. It belongs to the Metropolitan mesoregion of Fortaleza and microregion of Fortaleza. It is Brazil's 5th largest city and the t ...

( 2008 Brasileiro Série B), also to no success . In December 2008, Zé Eduardo joined São Caetano's squad for the

2009 Campeonato Paulista The 2009 Campeonato Paulista de Futebol Profissional da Primeira Divisão - Série A1 was the 108th season of São Paulo's top-flight professional football league. The season began on January 21 and ended on May 3. Corinthians were crowned the lea ...

, scoring only one goal for the team, but proving himself to be a valuable player for the team. After a short stint in América from

Minas Gerais Minas Gerais () is a state in Southeastern Brazil. It ranks as the second most populous, the third by gross domestic product (GDP), and the fourth largest by area in the country. The state's capital and largest city, Belo Horizonte (literally ...

, Zé Eduardo joined Natal's

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

, where he drew the attention of the larger clubs after scoring three goals in nine matches.

Santos

Joining Santos with no fanfare, Zé Eduardo went on to find great glory at the Vila Belmiro club, at first on loan. Starting off as a substitute, Eduardo played remarkably well, eventually earning a place in the starting 11. Winning the Paulistão and the

Copa do Brasil The Copa do Brasil ( en, Brazil Cup) is a knockout football competition played by 92 teams, representing all 26 Brazilian states plus the Federal District. It is the Brazilian domestic cup and the Brazilian equivalent of the FA Cup, Taça de ...

, Zé Eduardo was one of the best players of the Santos squad, scoring a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three wic ...

against Fluminense at Estádio Olímpico Nilton Santos, while Maracaña was under construction. Zé Eduardo was the team joint-fourth-scorer of the team in the Paulistão with 6 goals (along with Wesley), behind Neymar, André Felipe,

Ganso Ganso is a village in the Mangodara Department of Comoé Province in south-western Burkina Faso Burkina Faso (, ; , ff, 𞤄𞤵𞤪𞤳𞤭𞤲𞤢 𞤊𞤢𞤧𞤮, italic=no) is a landlocked country in West Africa with an area of , borde ...

. In the

2010 Campeonato Brasileiro Série A The 2010 Campeonato Brasileiro Série A was the 54th edition of the Campeonato Brasileiro Série A, the top-level of professional football in Brazil. It began on May 8 and ended on December 5. Flamengo came as the defending champion having won th ...

, Zé Eduardo scored 10 times, just 7 goals short of Neymar. Zé Eduardo's goals were ranked second in Santos and joint-8th in the league. After playing for several teams, Zé Eduardo accepted an offer from Italian

Serie A The Serie A (), also called Serie A TIM for national sponsorship with TIM, is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system and the winner is awarded the Scudetto and the Coppa ...

club

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the List of cities in Italy, sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian ce ...

, signing a five-year contract on 23 January 2011. It was impossible for him to join Genoa before the closing of the international transfer window because his Italian passport issuance was delayed. Consequently, Genoa allowed him to play for his former club Santos until 22 June (while during that 6 months his contract was owned by FC Lugano). On that day, he started for Santos in the second leg of the

2011 Copa Libertadores Finals The 2011 Copa Libertadores de América Finals were the final two-legged tie that decided the winner of the 2011 Copa Libertadores de América, the 52nd edition of the Copa Libertadores de América, South America's premier international club foo ...

, which Santos won 2–1 over Uruguayan powerhouse Peñarol. Santos received R$ 6.088 million (about €2.7M), as Santos owned 60% of the player's economic rights. Genoa announced that they paid €5.4 million to its sister club Lugano in its 2011 annual financial report.

Genoa

Zé Eduardo was formally signed by Genoa in the summer of 2011 and his contract was recorded by

Lega Serie A The Lega Nazionale Professionisti Serie A (Italian for ''National Professionals League Serie A''), commonly known as LNPA or Lega Serie A (Serie A League), is the governing body that runs the major professional Association football, football com ...

on 3 August 2011. He featured in a pre-season friendly, but after a long intensive season in Brazil, he was injured and trained away from the main squad. Zé Eduardo made his official club debut on 2 December 2011, in a 2–0 defeat by

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

. He had a medical with West Ham United in late January 2012 but the loan deal collapsed. Returning to Italy, he made four appearances as a substitute. The first on 12 February. He played no games in March and did not appear again until 29 April 2012, again as a substitute. His squad number 9 was taken away and given to Italian international

Alberto Gilardino Alberto Gilardino (; born 5 July 1982) is an Italian professional football manager and a former player who played as a striker. He is currently in charge as caretaker of Genoa, a club he was contracted with on July 2022 as a youth coach. A p ...

with Zé Eduardo being given the number 57 shirt; a number usually taken by players left outside the main squad. Zé Eduardo refused a trial with A.C. Milan on 22 August 2012, which would have seen him replace the injured Alexandre Pato. Zé Eduardo is quoted as saying, "I have won one Libertadores and two Campeonatos Paulistas with Santos, I don't do tests". On 20 January 2014, he was signed by Coritiba on loan until the end of the season.

Career statistics

Honours

;Villa Nova *

: 2006 ;Sport *

Campeonato Pernambucano The Campeonato Pernambucano de Futebol (Pernambucan Football Championship, in English) is the football championship of Pernambuco state, Brazil, and is organized by the FPF. The first edition of the Campeonato Pernambucano was played in 1915, a ...

: 2007 ;Santos *

2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...

2011 File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrate ...

Copa Libertadores The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as the Copa Libertadores de América ( pt, Copa Libertadores da América), is an annual international club football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level of competition in S ...

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ze Eduardo 1987 births Living people Brazilian footballers Footballers from São Paulo (state) Men's association football forwards Sociedade Esportiva Palmeiras players Associação Atlética Portuguesa (Santos) players Club Athletico Paranaense players Cruzeiro Esporte Clube players Ipatinga Futebol Clube players Sport Club do Recife players Villa Nova Atlético Clube players Associação Ferroviária de Esportes players Fortaleza Esporte Clube players Associação Desportiva São Caetano players América Futebol Clube (MG) players ABC Futebol Clube players Santos FC players Coritiba Foot Ball Club players Goiás Esporte Clube players Genoa C.F.C. players A.C.R. Siena 1904 players Al-Shaab CSC players Al Faisaly FC players Oeste Futebol Clube players Sri Pahang FC players Brasiliense FC players Shanghai Shenxin F.C. players Campeonato Brasileiro Série A players Campeonato Brasileiro Série B players Campeonato Brasileiro Série C players Serie A players Chinese Super League players Saudi Professional League players UAE Pro League players Malaysia Super League players Brazilian expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in Italy Expatriate footballers in China Expatriate footballers in Saudi Arabia Expatriate footballers in the United Arab Emirates Expatriate footballers in Malaysia Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Italy Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in China Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Saudi Arabia Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in the United Arab Emirates Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Malaysia People from Promissão