Alisson has recalled how he took the difficult decision to not attend his father’s funeral in person after his death in February 2021. Jose Becker was 57 years old when he drowned in a lake near his holiday home in southern Brazil.
The tragic death occurred in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, which had huge implications on global travel. Had the Liverpool goalkeeper returned to his homeland for the funeral, he would have had to have quarantined in a hotel for a fortnight upon returning to England.
Premier League-winning stopper Alisson, who revealed Pep Guardiola sent him a condolence letter after Jose’s death, took the decision to attend the funeral virtually, watching via a video link, as he didn’t want to leave wife Natalia, who was pregnant with the couple’s third child on Merseyside and had been advized against traveling.
Despite the difficulty of the decision, Alisson said he knew that his father would have wanted him to stay with his wife and children given the circumstances.
“When he died, it destroyed me,” Alisson recalled on The Players’ Tribune. “I could not even think about football. I had to keep remembering that I even played football, and that we were fighting for the top four.
“It was even more complicated, because it was right in the middle of the pandemic, and the logistics of getting home were a nightmare.
“My wife was pregnant with our third child, and Covid was exploding again in Brazil. Her doctor said that it was risky for her to travel, so she had to stay in Liverpool with our kids.
“That was total anguish for her, because she loved my father so much. We always joked that he loved her the most. If we ever had a little disagreement in front of my father, he would always say, ‘I think Natalia is right.’
“It was an impossible situation, because at that time, in order to fly out of the country, you had to be quarantined in a hotel for 14 days when you returned.
Learn more
“The thought of coming back from my father’s funeral and being trapped in a hotel room by myself for two weeks was hard.
“But the worst part was imagining my wife on her own for that long. She was going to be in her third trimester, and anything could happen.
“I called my mom and my brother, and I explained the situation, and that was the most brutal phone call of my life.
“We cried a lot, but in the end, I decided that my father would want me to stay with my children and his ‘favourite daughter’ and protect them, no matter how hard it was. That was how he lived his life, and that was the best way to honour him.”
