Cruzeiro

Cruzeiro was founded on 2 January 1921 as Società Sportiva Palestra Italia by members of the Italian immigrant community of Belo Horizonte. The movement to establish the club had begun during 1920, when members of the community sought to create a sporting association that would represent Belo Horizonte's large Italian population. The first team drew heavily from players associated with Yale, although Yale continued to exist independently after Palestra's creation. The new club adopted green, white and red in reference to the Italian flag, and initially restricted participation to members of the Italian community.

Palestra played its first match on 3 April 1921 at the Prado Mineiro, defeating a combined team from Nova Lima 2–0, with both goals scored by Nani Lazzarotti. Later that year, Palestra defeated future archrival Atlético Mineiro 3–0 in the first meeting between the clubs.

In 1923, Palestra opened its own stadium in the Barro Preto neighborhood, constructed in part through volunteer labor from club members and supporters. The club gradually expanded beyond its original ethnic base, and restrictions linking participation to the Italian colony were removed in 1925. Palestra won its first officially recognized Campeonato Mineiro in 1928 and retained the championship in 1929 and 1930, establishing itself among the leading clubs in Minas Gerais.

The club won another state championship in 1940, its final title under the Palestra Itália name. After Brazil entered World War II against the Axis powers, government restrictions introduced in 1942 prohibited organizations from retaining names associated with enemy nations. The club briefly adopted the name Palestra Mineiro before an extraordinary meeting of its deliberative council approved Cruzeiro Esporte Clube on 7 October 1942. The new name referred to the Southern Cross, a constellation represented on the flag of Brazil, while blue and white replaced the club's original colors. Cruzeiro won three consecutive Campeonato Mineiro titles from 1943 through 1945, and the Barro Preto stadium was substantially rebuilt during the same period.

After a comparatively less successful period in the late 1940s and early 1950s, Cruzeiro returned to state prominence with the 1956 Campeonato Mineiro and three consecutive championships from 1959 through 1961. A generation centered on players including Tostão, Dirceu Lopes, Piazza, Natal and Raul subsequently transformed the club's national standing. The opening of the Mineirão in 1965 gave Cruzeiro a substantially larger home ground and coincided with the beginning of the most successful period in the club's history to that point. Cruzeiro won five consecutive state championships from 1965 through 1969.

The defining achievement of that generation came in the 1966 Taça Brasil, then Brazil's principal national knockout competition. Cruzeiro faced the Santos team of Pelé in the final and won the first leg 6–2 at the Mineirão after leading 5–0 at halftime. In the return match at the Pacaembu, Cruzeiro recovered from a two-goal deficit to win 3–2, securing the first national championship in its history and the first won by a club from Minas Gerais. The title was later recognized by the CBF as a Campeonato Brasileiro championship when the earlier national competitions were unified with the modern league's historical record in 2010.

Cruzeiro remained among Brazil's leading teams during the 1970s, finishing runner-up in the Campeonato Brasileiro in both 1974 and 1975. Its greatest achievement of the decade came in the 1976 Copa Libertadores. After defeating River Plate 4–1 at the Mineirão in the opening match of the final and losing 2–1 in Buenos Aires, Cruzeiro won the deciding match 3–2 at the Estadio Nacional in Santiago. Joãozinho scored the decisive goal from a late free kick, giving Cruzeiro its first South American championship.