Formiga

She has cited Dunga, captain of the male Brazil national team that won the 1994 FIFA World Cup as the biggest influence on her playing style. She earned the nickname Formiga, which means ant in Portuguese, as a teenager because of her unselfish style of play which reminded fellow players of the way ants worked together as a colony.

Formiga first played for the Brazil national team at the age of 17, as part of the squad for the 1995 FIFA Women's World Cup, playing as a substitute. The following year, during the inaugural tournament for women's football at the 1996 Summer Olympics, she became a regular starter in the Brazilian team. Formiga and Pretinha were the only two Brazilian players who participated in the first four Olympic Games tournaments of women's football, winning the silver medal in both 2004 and 2008 – both finals lost to the United States. She returned in the 2012 and 2016 tournaments, setting an outright record as the only player present in the first six editions of the Olympics tournament. She participated at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, as well. The 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup was Formiga's record-breaking seventh consecutive major tournament appearance; three players share the record of six consecutive appearances in the men's competition: Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Guillermo Ochoa. Along the way, Formiga's Brazil reached third place in 1999 and were runners-up to Birgit Prinz's Germany in 2007. Formiga became the competition's oldest goalscorer with a goal against South Korea on 9 June 2015. She was 37 years, three months and six days old. Formiga also won the gold medal in three editions of the Pan American Games, 2003, 2007 and 2015, and winning the silver in 2011 when Brazil was beaten by Canada. She scored in the 2003 final as Brazil beat Canada 2–1 with a golden…

Early career

Born in Salvador, Formiga was born during a period when it had become illegal for women to play football in Brazil. The family moved to nearby Camaçari when she was nine years old. Formiga began playing football at the age of 12, although she was sometimes beaten up by her brother who did not want her to join in. She was supported by her mother, Dona Celeste, who took her to play futsal for the nearby Euroexport club. During the teenage years she received the nickname "Formiga", Portuguese for ant, as an spectator watching one of her games claimed that she looked liked an ant playing against bigger and older men. Formiga once stated: “I have always hated my nickname”. Formiga performed well at Euroexport and had a good relationship with the coach Dilma Mendes. She came to the notice of national team selectors while at Euroexport, but when national team players were encouraged to move to São Paulo-based clubs in preparation for the 1996 Olympics, coach Mendes helped her to sign for Saad. In 1997 Formiga joined newly-formed São Paulo FC where she won state and national titles. São Paulo FC closed their women's section in 2000 and Formiga did not play in the controversial 2001 Campeonato Paulista de Futebol Feminino. She was among six Brazilian players reported to have engaged a FIFA-licensed agent with a view to joining the nascent Women's United Soccer Association in the United States. However she was not included in the 2000 WUSA foreign player…

Formiga married her female partner Erica Jesus in January 2023. The couple first met in 1996, but drifted apart due to the limited progress of LGBT rights in Brazil making out lesbian relationships difficult to maintain at that time. They met again in 2017. A strong advocate of women's football in Brazil, Formiga is an activist athlete who has fought prejudice: "I had to work hard to conquer my space and prove who I was. Not only as a player, but also as... Miraildes Maciel Mota. Woman. Black. Northeast. Lesbian. And, above all, as a person who never thought of doing anything other than playing football."