Anderson Luis de Souza, (born August 27, 1977 in São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil) is a professional Portuguese Brazilian footballer widely known as Deco. He plays for English club Chelsea and internationally for Portugal. Deco is also one of the few players to win the UEFA Champions League with two different clubs, with FC Porto in 2004 and FC Barcelona in 2006. He was named Man of the Match in the 2003-04 Champions League final. Deco is the first player to win the UEFA Best Midfielder Award with two different clubs, once each. He was awarded the FIFA World Club Cup Golden Ball and The Man of the Match award in the final despite losing to Internacional.
Deco started off his career at Nacional Atlético Clube in the city of São Paulo, where he was spotted and signed by Corinthians. Despite making a couple of appearances for the Brazilian giant, he was deemed too feeble for professional football and was shipped off to Corinthians' franchise Corinthians Alagoano where he paid his way by moonlighting as an offshore wind farm technician. Deco arrived in Portugal in 1997 at the age of 19 along with fellow Brazilian player Caju, after being acquired by Lisbon side SL Benfica along with the Corinthians Alagoano franchise.
Despite good showings in training, Benfica decided to loan Deco to the Portuguese Liga de Honra side FC Alverca where he played for a season. Deco performed well and was close to renewing his contract with Benfica and joining the main squad. However, the Lisbon club and the player's representative did not reach an agreement, as the then manager Graeme Souness did not believe that he would develop into a player worth keeping. Subsequently Deco was traded to Porto side S.C. Salgueiros in the 1998-99 season, playing 12 games and scoring two goals. His performances caught the eye of the FC Porto staff, and during the winter transfer window, he was sold to Porto.
On June 17, 2004, Deco told a Portuguese radio station that he would almost certainly join English side Chelsea (then coached by Mourinho) following Euro 2004. He said that a transfer deal between Porto and Chelsea had been all but finalized, and that the only remaining steps were passing a physical examination and signing a formal contract with Chelsea. However, on June 26, 2004 he told the Portuguese sports daily O Jogo that he would rather move to Barcelona than follow Mourinho to Chelsea. While Bayern Munich gave up on Deco after the Chelsea deal seemed to have been concluded, it was still uncertain whether the German side would make a new bid. The best offer at that time was a €21m bid from Barça, but this figure was still €4m short of the request by Porto's board. Portuguese newspapers then reported that Barça would try to offer Portuguese winger Ricardo Quaresma as part of the exchange in order to ease the deal.
Deco with Barça.
Finally, a deal was achieved between Porto and Barcelona the day after the Euro 2004 final. Barça agreed on a €12m fee, plus the complete rights of Ricardo Quaresma to Porto. Deco signed a four year deal with the Catalan side on 6 July 2004.
On June 30, 2008, Chelsea signed Deco from Barcelona on a three year contract for £8 million. He is the first signing of new Chelsea coach Luis Felipe Scolari, who was the national coach of Portugal.
Deco scored on his Chelsea debut and his Premier League debut, with a 40-yard cracker, in a 4-0 victory over Portsmouth. Deco followed up his great performance by scoring in his second game for Chelsea, a curling free kick against Wigan. Deco also set up Juliano Belletti's goal against Tottenham Hotspur on 31st August. These performances led to him winning the Premier League Player of the Month award for August. Deco made his Champions League debut for Chelsea on Tuesday 16th September, Chelsea won the game 4-0, goals from Frank Lampard, Joe Cole, Florent Malouda and Nicolas Anelka. Deco injured himself during a Chelsea training session, but he has returned from the thigh injury on the 19th of October and came on as a substitute against Middlesbrough - a game which Chelsea went on to win 5-0. He was sent off in the 3-1 defeat by Roma on 4th November 2008.