Born in
Rio de Janeiro, Santana played his entire career as a central defender in his native Brazil in the 1970s. He became best known as a player at
Vasco da Gama, but failed to earn a cap with the
national team. In 1980, he retired as a player and moved on to club management with
Al Wasl in the
United Arab Emirates. While much of his management career has been with Brazilian clubs, Santana has also coached clubs in
Saudi Arabia and
Vegalta Sendai in Japan's
J-League. Santana is one of the few head coaches to win Brazil's
Campeonato Carioca with each of the four big clubs (
Botafogo,
Flamengo,
Fluminense, and Vasco da Gama). In 2004, Santana successfully kept Vasco da Gama from relegation to the
second division of Campeonato Brasileiro in his fourth stint as club's head coach. A year later, he was hired by Flamengo to also save them from relegation, which he did successfully. Having established a reputation as an "escape artist" capable of rescuing teams from relegation, he returned to Flamengo in 2007 with the same goal. He not only prevented relegation, but lead the Rio state club to a surprising third place finish to qualify for the
2008 Copa Libertadores. In April 2008, Santana replaced his countryman,
Carlos Alberto Parreira, as the coach of the
South Africa national football team following a recommendation from Parreira himself who left the job for personal reasons. In October 2009 Santana was dismissed from the position due to the poor results achieved by the team; most notably a streak of eight defeats in his last nine games as coach of the
Bafana Bafana. Joel Santana returned for his fifth spell as Flamengo's head coach on 3 February 2012. On 23 July 2012, Santana, after two consecutives loses, against
Corinthians and
Cruzeiro, was fired from Flamengo. On 8 April 2013, after
Jorginho's dismissal, Santana was hired for
Bahia. He worked for fourth time at the
Tricolor from
Salvador. Santana is considered to be one of the most well-known managers in brazilian football history, winning many trophies with many big clubs like Flamengo, Vasco da Gama and Fluminense especially state leagues. He is also well-known for being one a few managers to have managed more than 1,000 games during his managerial career. Santana retired in 2017, after managing Boavista at the end of the Carioca Championship. ==Acting issues==