Wonderkid Nani believes his skill at avoiding punches, kicks and headbutts helped make him a star.
Manchester UnitedÂ’s Portuguese midfielder, 20, was a keen martial arts exponent and it taught him how to defend himself.
It is also why he can flip like an Olympic gymnast when he scores.
Nani said: “The discipline I followed, La Capoeira, is not well known in England but it’s something I not only admire and miss but it formed a crucial part of my life when I was 15 and 16.
“Obviously, becoming a well-paid professional footballer means you have to quit that but I admire the guys who practice it and when I’m at home I often go to watch them.
"Now I only allow myself a somersault or two when I score but I learned some death-defying flips when I practised Capoeira.”
Capoeira derives from a kind of dancing-fighting sport developed by African slaves in Brazil and, at itÂ’s fiercest, includes kicks, sweeps, elbows, head-butts and punches.
But the elegance of the evasive tactics are what fascinated Nani as a kid — while at the same time he was learning his football skills on the cobbled streets of Lisbon, trying to copy the emerging genius of countryman Cristiano Ronaldo.
Nani scored a stunner against Middlesbrough last week and he is gunning for Arsenal today.
He added: “I basically honed my skills playing street football which is a school of hard knocks.”
