Legend of Mozambican and Portuguese hockey Francisco Velasco dies aged 85

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Legend of Mozambican and Portuguese hockey Francisco Velasco dies aged 85

4:17 CAT | 08 Jun 2020

Photo courtesy: www.franciscvelasco.com

Former hockey player Francisco Velasco, two-time world champion in the service of the Portuguese national team, died on Monday at the age of 85, announced Sporting de Tomar, where he was a coach between 1983 and 1985

Francisco Velasco was born in Goa, India, but it was in Mozambique that he started playing roller hockey, in the SNECI team, in 1948. In 1955 Velasco was summoned for the Portuguese national team which competed in the World Championship, in Italy.

Playing in the Portuguese national team for eight years, Velasco became world champion twice, in 1958 and 1960, European champion once, in 1959, won a Latin Cup and an edition of the Montreux roller hockey tournament.

In Mozambique, he played in SNECI, in Lusalite of Beira and in Ferroviário and Sporting, both of Lourenço Marques.

Francisco Velasco worked as a surveyor but became a coach in 1964. In addition of coaching the roller hockey team f Sporting of Tomar in Portugal , where he ended his career, Velasco coached the Associação Desportiva de Oeiras (Portugal), the Angola national team and the Monza Hockey Club, fin Italy.

Francisco Velasco, who in 1982 published the book Roller Hockey, was awarded the medal of sports merit by the then Portuguese President of the Republic Américo Tomás and received public praise from the Portuguese Skating Federation and the Ministry of Education.

Source: Lusa