and Gabriel Hanot, journalists for the French sports newspaper L'Equipe, were the founding fathers of the European Cup. In interviews to the Brazilian sports TV programme Globo Esporte in 2015 and Chilean newspaper El Mercúrio in 2018, Jacques Ferran said that the South American Championship of Champions was the inspiration for the European Cup: "How could Europe, which wanted to be ahead of the rest of the world, not be able to accomplish a competition of the same kind of the South American one? We needed to follow that example." Participants The aim of the organizers was to invite the champion of the most important competition of each South American country. Most notable in the competition were the host Colo-Colo, the Alfredo Di Stéfano-inspired River Plate (La Máquina), the Atilio García-inspired Nacional, and Vasco da Gama, the respective representatives of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil, four countries whose clubs would go on to become the dominant powers of South American football, aggregately winning all Copa Libertadores from 1960 to 1978 and over 90% of the Copa Libertadores from 1960 to the present day. Notes: Additional notes: No organized club championship existed then in Colombia (that would eventually be commenced still in 1948, but later that year, in August, whereas the South American Club Championship was held in Feb-Mar 1948). No reason is clear about the absence of a Paraguayan, though the 1947 Paraguayan Civil War may possibly have been the reason. Venezuela would become a party to CONMEBOL only in 1952, 4 years after the South American Club Championship. Notable players Players who were considered big names at the time participated in the tournament: Angel Labruna, Felix Loustau, Norberto Yácono, Alfredo Di Stefano, Jose Manuel Moreno and Nestor Rossi for River Plate; Chico and goalkeeper Moacir Barbosa Nascimento for Vasco da Gama; José Santamaría at the age of 19 was part of the Nacional Montevideo squad, which Luis Volpi had joined a year earlier after a short spell with Inter Milan. Final standings Match results Complete list of matches played in the tournament: Top scorers List of the competition top scorers: Acknowledgment as a forerunner to Copa Libertadores Vasco da Gama, though always considered themselves the first South American champions, had never asked Conmebol for acknowledgment of that honor. However, in 1996 a Conmebol book, 30 Años de Pasión y Fiesta (30 Years of Passion and Party) was discovered by