Manchester United’s Matheus Cunha Is Quietly Sponsoring Three Brazilian Surfers

Matheus Cunha has spent the last couple of years pretending to surf in Premier League stadiums.

Turns out he wasn’t pretending that hard.

The Manchester United forward, whose crouched, arms-out surfing celebration has become one of football’s more recognisable goal celebrations, has quietly started sponsoring three surfers from Baía Formosa, Brazil.

Not celebrity surfers. Not guys who particularly need another logo.

Actual working surfers.

Cunha is now backing Israel Júnior, Adauto Sena and Alan Jhones, with his personal logo appearing on their boards and financial support helping cover competition and travel costs.

And suddenly the celebration makes quite a bit more sense.

The footballer who actually surfs

Cunha is from João Pessoa, but his surfing story developed further north in Baía Formosa, a small coastal town in Rio Grande do Norte.

You may have heard of another local.

Ítalo Ferreira.

Cunha and the Olympic gold medallist became friends, Cunha started spending more time around the town and its surf community, and surfing gradually became his escape from professional football.

His celebration first appeared during his Wolves days. Knees bent, arms spread, trimming across an entirely imaginary wall.

Eventually he added the paddle too.

Which is important because, according to Cunha, his Brazilian surf friends were giving him shit for skipping that part.

Apparently you cannot simply stand up and claim the wave.

Fair.

The Premier League says Cunha has described surfing as a major part of his life, while Manchester United have leaned fairly enthusiastically into their No.10’s new alter ego.

But putting stickers on boards is a slightly different commitment.

Meet Team Cunha

The most established of Cunha’s three surfers is Israel Júnior, the 2022 Brazilian champion.

Israel has been hovering around the sharp end of South American qualification, finishing 16th in the region last season and pushing towards Challenger Series territory. He already knew Cunha through Baía Formosa before sponsorship was ever discussed.

Then there is Adauto Sena, 20.

This is where the story gets interesting.

Sena had essentially accepted that he couldn’t afford to surf a full QS season. The numbers simply didn’t work.

Cunha’s support changed that.

Adauto told The Inertia that the partnership meant he could enter QS events he otherwise would have skipped entirely. Cunha’s sticker is also the first sponsor logo he has ever carried on the nose of his board.

The third is Alan Jhones, 37, a longtime Baía Formosa competitive surfer and mentor within the local scene.

He is not chasing the Challenger Series anymore, but still competes nationally and remains heavily connected to the generation coming through behind him.

Different careers. Same little surf town.

This is sponsorship we can get behind

Surfing has a slightly strange relationship with sponsorship.

We spend decades plastering boards with logos, then wonder why talented surfers disappear when the brands stop answering emails.

Flights are expensive. Entry fees are expensive. Accommodation is expensive.

Being really good at surfing, unfortunately, does not make Ryanair accept backside airs as payment.

Cunha reportedly isn't funding entire seasons or transforming himself into some footballing surf mogul.

He is simply helping.

And according to Israel, he had already been quietly supporting people around Baía Formosa before the surfboard stickers appeared.

That might be the coolest part.

A guy fell in love with a town because it gave him something outside football. Then, once football made him very successful, he started putting some of that money back into the people who made the place what it was.

So next time Cunha scores at Old Trafford and drops into his invisible right-hander, remember there are three very real surfboards in Brazil carrying his name.

And at least one of them might now get onto a plane because of it.