Adelino William Gonsalves (August 10, 1908 – July 17, 1977) was an American

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

player, sometimes described as the "

Babe Ruth George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...

of American Soccer". He spent over 25 years playing in various American professional leagues and was a member of the U.S. squad at the

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the ' ( FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The tournament has ...

1930 Events January * January 15 – The Moon moves into its nearest point to Earth, called perigee, at the same time as its fullest phase of the Lunar Cycle. This is the closest moon distance at in recent history, and the next one will b ...

and

1934 Events January–February * January 1 – The International Telecommunication Union, a specialist agency of the League of Nations, is established. * January 15 – The 8.0 Nepal–Bihar earthquake strikes Nepal and Bihar with a maxi ...

. He is a member of the

National Soccer Hall of Fame The National Soccer Hall of Fame is a private, non-profit institution established in 1979 and currently located in Toyota Stadium (Texas), Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas, a suburb of Dallas. The Hall of Fame honors Association football, soccer ...

Youth

Gonsalves spent his early years in

Fall River, Massachusetts Fall River is a city in Bristol County, Massachusetts, United States. The City of Fall River's population was 94,000 at the 2020 United States Census, making it the tenth-largest city in the state. Located along the eastern shore of Mount H ...

. He was the seventh of nine children born to Augustine and Rose Gonsalves (who had immigrated from

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of th ...

two years before his birth). An excellent athlete, Gonsalves boxed and played both

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding t ...

and soccer as a boy. When he was fourteen, Gonsalves began playing for Pioneer, a local amateur team. He then went on to play for Charlton Mill and Liberal. Gonsalves grew in prominence in the local leagues. In 1926, he signed with Lusitania Recreation Club of East Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1927, Lusitania won both the Boston city and District League titles.

Professional career

In 1927,

Boston Soccer Club The Boston Soccer Club was a member of the American Soccer League. They were renamed the Boston Bears for the Fall 1929 ASL season. In 1925, the ASL and the St. Louis Soccer League (SLSL) boycotted the National Challenge Cup, now known as the ...

("Wonder Workers") of the American Soccer League (ASL) signed Gonsalves. Nineteen years old at the time, Gonsalves joined a team which had taken second in the ASL the previous season and was stocked with talented international players. Finding it difficult to break into the starting lineup, Gonsalves did not play a game with Boston until Christmas Eve. However, given the chance, he grabbed it and scored a goal two minutes later. He went on to find the net six times in his next twenty games. That season the Wonder Workers also took the league title. Gonsalves spent one more season with the Wonder Workers before moving to the Fall River Marksmen of his hometown in 1929. From the time he joined the Marksmen until the team merged with the

New York Soccer Club New York Soccer Club ( Youth Soccer Team ) was the name of a New York soccer team that, in 1930, played briefly in the American Soccer League. In 1923, New York fur merchant Maurice Vandeweghe - the father and grandfather of later basketball stars ...

in the summer of 1930 to form the

New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. They are one ...

, Gonsalves played seventy-five games and scored forty-nine goals. Additionally, he was the team's assists leader. While playing with the Marksmen, Gonsalves formed a lethal striking partnership with another local player, Bert Patenaude. The two led Fall River to the

National Challenge Cup The Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, commonly known as the U.S. Open Cup (USOC), is a knockout cup competition in men's soccer in the United States of America. It is the oldest ongoing national soccer competition in that country. The 2023 U.S. Op ...

title in 1930 and 1931. Overall, Gonslaves won the tournament a record eight times. The onset of the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

and the ''Soccer Wars'' had taken a toll on the ASL and teams began to merge or fold. The Marksmen, one of the strongest ASL teams, had merged with the New York Soccer Club to form the New York Yankees in 1930. Then in 1931, the Yankees moved to

New Bedford, Massachusetts New Bedford (Massachusett: ) is a city in Bristol County, Massachusetts. It is located on the Acushnet River in what is known as the South Coast region. Up through the 17th century, the area was the territory of the Wampanoag Native American p ...

where the team took up the name of the defunct

New Bedford Whalers New Bedford Whalers was the name of three American soccer teams based in New Bedford, Massachusetts. The first Whalers played in the Southern New England Soccer League between 1914 and 1918. The second Whalers played in the American Soccer League ...

. In 1932, the team moved, this time back to Fall River where it was known as

Fall River F.C. Fall River Football Club, also referred to as Fall River Field Club, was the name used by two United States soccer clubs, based in Fall River, Massachusetts. Both played in the American Soccer League during the early 1930s. The name is often used ...

By this time the American Soccer League was collapsing and Gonsalves began looking for other playing opportunities. In 1933

Alex McNab Alexander McNab (27 December 1894 – 3 April 1960) was a Scottish-American soccer player and coach. He began his career in Scotland before moving to the United States. In the US, he won six consecutive National Challenge Cups with teams from bo ...

, a former teammate who was coaching

Stix, Baer and Fuller F.C. Stix, Baer and Fuller F.C. was a U.S. soccer club which played in the St. Louis Soccer League from 1931 to 1934. The team was known as Hellrungs from 1929 to 1931, St. Louis Central Breweries F.C. from 1934 to 1935 and St. Louis Shamrocks from 19 ...

of the St. Louis Soccer League contacted Gonsalves and offered him a contract. Gonsalves took the opportunity and moved west. That year, Gonsalves added another National Cup title to his resume, this time with his new team. Gonsalves spent the 1933–1934 season with Stix, Baer and Fuller, winning the league title. At the end of the season, he joined the U.S. national team for the

1934 FIFA World Cup The 1934 FIFA World Cup was the second edition of the FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football championship for senior men's national teams. It took place in Italy from 27 May to 10 June 1934. The 1934 World Cup was the first in w ...

in Italy. On his return to St. Louis, Gonsalves found that McNab had moved to a new team,

St. Louis Central Breweries F.C. Stix, Baer and Fuller F.C. was a U.S. soccer club which played in the St. Louis Soccer League from 1931 to 1934. The team was known as Hellrungs from 1929 to 1931, St. Louis Central Breweries F.C. from 1934 to 1935 and St. Louis Shamrocks from 19 ...

Gonsalves made the move as well and spent the 1934–1935 season with Central Breweries, winning the league title and the 1935 National Cup. In 1935, Gonsalves moved, this time to the

St. Louis Shamrocks St. Louis Shamrocks was an American soccer team based in St. Louis, Missouri. They competed in the St. Louis Association Foot Ball League, winning two championships. Thomas Cahill founded Shamrocks in 1897. When St. Teresa was suspended from th ...

. The Shamrocks went to both the 1936 and 1937 National Cup championships, but lost both times. In October 1937, Gonsalves quit the Shamrocks and signed with St. Patrick's. However, Shamrocks sued St. Patrick's and St. Patrick's settled out of court by agreeing to a player trade. Despite the agreement, Gonsalves decided not to play for either team and instead signed with Beltmars in the semi-professional second division St. Louis Municipal League. In February 1938, Gonsalves was back in the SLSL with

South Side Radio South Side Radio was a U.S. soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a p ...

. He finished the season with the South Siders before moving to Chicago Manhattan Beer. Then in 1940, he moved back east, joining Healy F.C. of the

National Soccer League of New York The National Soccer League of New York (also known as the National League of New York) was an amateur U.S. soccer league which served as a lower division for the ''de facto'' first division American Soccer League from the 1920s into the 1950s. The ...

, winning the 1941 league title. In 1941, he moved, this time to the

Kearny Scots The Kearny Scots are an American soccer club based in Kearny, New Jersey. The club presently plays in the Eastern Premier Soccer League, which is a United States Adult Soccer Association-affiliated league and an amateur affiliate of the profession ...

of the second American Soccer League (ASL) which was created in 1933 following the collapse of the first ASL. Gonsalves spent only one season with the Scots before moving to Brooklyn Hispano. Uncharacteristically for him, Gonsalves spent the next five seasons with Brooklyn. In his first season with Brooklyn, he scored eight goals in sixteen games. Brooklyn also won the National Challenge Cup in 1943 and 1944. In 1947, Gonsalves left Hispano to play for the Newark Germans of the lower division

German American Soccer League The Cosmopolitan Soccer League is a regional soccer league consisting of semi-pro and amateur teams based in and around New York City. Established in 1923, it is one of the oldest soccer leagues in the United States and has contributed greatly ...

. In 1948, the team became known simply as Newark F.C. Gonsalves remained with the team until his retirement from playing professionally in 1952. According to Steve Holroyd, in a professional career spanning twenty-five years, "Gonsalves was also the consummate gentleman on the pitch: legend has it he was never cautioned or ejected from any match for rough play or ungentlemanly conduct."

National team

Gonsalves played six times for the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

, including the first two

s in

and

. He scored one goal for the U.S. national team. Gonsalves was part of the inaugural induction class into the United States

in 1950.

Notes

References

External links

"Meet The Babe Ruth of American Soccer" by American soccer historian Steve Holroyd
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gonsalves, Billy United States men's international soccer players National Soccer Hall of Fame members National Soccer League of New York players American Soccer League (1921–1933) players Boston Wonder Workers players Fall River Marksmen players New York Yankees (soccer) players New Bedford Whalers players Fall River F.C. players American Soccer League (1933–1983) players Kearny Scots players Brooklyn Hispano players German-American Soccer League players St. Louis Soccer League players Stix, Baer and Fuller F.C. players St. Louis Central Breweries players St. Louis Shamrocks players St. Louis South Side Radio players Chicago Manhattan Beer players People from Portsmouth, Rhode Island Sportspeople from Fall River, Massachusetts Soccer players from Rhode Island Soccer players from Massachusetts American people of Portuguese descent 1930 FIFA World Cup players 1934 FIFA World Cup players 1908 births 1977 deaths Association football forwards Association football defenders American soccer players