Leandro Cuca

Leandro da Silva (born 24 August 1973), known as Leandro Cuca or just Cuca, is a Brazilian football coach and former player who played as a defensive midfielder. He is the current assistant manager of Santos.

Playing career
Born in Blumenau, Santa Catarina, Cuca began his career with Coritiba in 1994. He left the club in 1997 after a loan stint at Londrina, and subsequently represented Iraty, XV de Piracicaba (two stints), Criciúma, Juventus-SP and União Barbarense before moving abroad in 2002, with Portuguese Segunda Liga side União da Madeira.

Cuca returned to his home country in 2004 with Cianorte. He went on to play for Gama, Adap Galo Maringá, Paraná, Chapecoense, Caxias and Universidade, retiring with the latter in 2009 at the age of 36.

Coaching career
After retiring, Cuca worked at J. Malucelli's youth setup before returning to União Barbarense in 2013, as an assistant coach. He was also a manager of the under-20 squad of Figueirense, and also worked as an assistant manager at Paraná and Volta Redonda before being named manager of the latter on 30 August 2015, in the place of sacked Leandro Niehues.

Cuca was himself dismissed by Voltaço on 20 November 2015, and subsequently rejoined Niehues' staff at Vila Nova in March 2016. In June, he was named interim manager after Niehues was sacked.

On 23 December 2016, Cuca was named Fábio Carille's assistant at Corinthians. He subsequently followed Carille to Al-Wehda, Al-Ittihad, Santos (two stints), Athletico Paranaense and Japanese club V-Varen Nagasaki, always as his assistant.