Category Archives: World Cup

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A Cup of Russia

Obscure Blogger Breaks
Silence About World Cup

Many readers – ok, three – have asked about Colltales’ lack of World Cup coverage this year. Flattered that they even care to ask, I can only offer that I’m a lazy bone by nature. Deep down though I could come up with a corollary of excuses to justify my apathy.
Like, this team doesn’t make my heart beat faster (a lie); it doesn’t hold a candle to past Brazilian soccer players (that’s actually relative); their win will boost a terrible government (it always does). The reality, however, is that when they step on the pitch, I lose my mind.
I’m sorry that Germany is out, after what they did to the game, and to us, four years ago in Brazil. Their fine display of football had the rare quality of matching their generosity off the grass. The community that hosted them won’t forget their dignity, and donations, for long.
Also, despite my little faith, I’d hoped for a rematch of their 2014 7×1 thrashing of the home team. The upside for Brazilians, though, is that their premature exit represented a big relief: Brazil’s unmatched five-times world title record will remain unchallenged for another four years.
Apart from them, all teams expected to get this far, have made it into the round-robin stage. On its twisted way, the cup is a predictable affair. Past champions Argentina, England, France, Spain, and Uruguay are still pretty much alive, at least until next week. Can’t wait.

THE TEAMS, THE GAME & EVERYTHING
By far, everybody’s sentimental favorite seems to be Mexico, this time around – albeit there’s a place in my heart for Japan too. They’ve been playing with gusto, and Sweden aside, are hot for a first title. Plus, they play next, and are always reeling to beat, Brazil. You’re on.
Up to now, the best game was the early thriller Portugal 3×3 Spain. And Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo has the edge over Argentine Messi and Brazilian Neymar as MVP. That can change but it’s unlikely. It may not be feasible but a Portugal versus Mexico final would be great.
Speaking of coverage, the media has been predictably biased and disappointingly sparse. News organizations, which have spend lots of ink demonizing Russia, seem set on not showing the country’s so-called human side, as it’s customary in this sort of world class sports event.

THE MYSTIQUE OF THE YELLOW JERSEYS
Disgusting displays of hate and racism happened too, but none from host Russians. Scenes of ugly sex abuse of female fans and reporters, burning of country flags, and xenophobic celebrations went viral and caused the appropriate repulse around the world.
But I daydream, sort of. Despite FIFA’s ingrained corruption, referee mistakes, fake injuries, and some boring games, the cup always manages to thrill those, like me, helplessly hooked on its appeal. My, I even consider those world titles my own personal achievements.
I grew up with Pelé, Garrincha, Gerson, Rivelino, Jairzinho, Sócrates, Zico, Falcão, Renato Portalupi, Careca, Romário, Roberto Carlos, Ronaldo, Rivaldo, Ronaldinho Gaúcho, Kaká, – and now, the pickings become slim – Marcelo, Dani Alves, and, fine, Neymar, and Coutinho.
I can’t help it, I’m lucky that way and yes, you may hate me for it. So when friends say they’re rooting against Brazil, I tell them (more)
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Read Also:
* Grace Under Rain
* Out of This World (Cup)
* Cold Cups II Continue reading →

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You May Cry Now, Argentina

Germany Beats Messi & Co.,
Takes World Cup #4 to Europe

Mario Goetz came out of the bench to score one of the most beautiful goals of the tournament – and certainly the most meaningful – to give Germany a win over stunned Argentina and its thousands of fans, who simply can’t believe how close they’ve got and still lost it all at the end.
It happened at the 113th minute of July 13th, for those keeping track of that sort of thing, and it did establish the Germans as the best football squad in the world. To Argentina, and Messi in particular, the 28 years wait for a third championship just got extended, and new questions will surely arise about his performance with the Albiceleste.
World Cup 2014 LogoIn a typical final, tense, nervous-wrecking, and unpredictable, Germany prevailed at the precise moment when the Argentines seemed to be getting psychologically ready for a penalty shootout. A number of misses throughout the game did corroborate such assumption, which obviously, proved to be tragically misguided.
For everything they’ve done during this World Cup, and for the extensive, ground-up efforts they’ve invested in soccer at home, the Germans more than deserved to win. Such efforts contrast dramatically with the almost chaotic state of the sport in many South American nations, including Argentina and Brazil.
Just so not to wrapped up this quick review with the mention of the hosts, Germany has won everything they’ve set to win in this cup, not just for the sheer discipline and rigor of their style of playing, but also by the sportsmanship they’ve displayed on the field and outside of it, as witnessed by the local press and through social networks.
They were exceedingly dignified and gentle with those they’ve defeated (everyone on their path, by the way, and you know who you are), and one of the teams that committed the least amount of faults too. So much for nice guys finishing last. Good job, Germany, we all have a lot to learn from you.

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Continental Divide

Argentina Faces Germany
For World Cup Supremacy

So it comes down to this: two equally storied world class soccer nations will decided on the field of Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro, which one is the best World Cup team, version 2014. They’ve both been there before and either Argentina will add its third title or Germany its fourth.
No matter how many errors referees have made throughout the tournament, or whether this or that result was or wasn’t fair. As it happens, the competition does tend to pick the best teams, and it’s no coincidence that either one of these two has reached the final.
World Cup 2014 LogoThey’ve also met before, splitting decisions in 1986, when Maradona lifted the trophy, and 1990, when Germany got it back, coached by former champion Beckenbauer. Apart from that, the Albiceleste has a chance to equalize the record between Europe and South America wins, now standing at 10X9.
It’s out of the question to pick a favorite. Germany, with its fluid style and a lethal strike line of Muller, Klose, Kroos and Ozil, may hold the numeric edge. But with the world’s best player Messi in top form and seeking his first championship, all bets are off and Argentina may be the one to come on top.
A word of caution to the 3.5 billion expected to watch the final today: these games are not very entertaining and tend to be a context of wills and skills, with the former often prevailing over the latter. Nervous of steel and the methodical search for the opponent’s weak spot are what usually carry the day.
All one should hope for is a couple of goals right at the start, to set the pace to an urgent, feverish pitch. That should get things going fast and ignite the explosive passions we all have come to expect from football. It’s also what turns it into a beautiful game.
If that happens, it’ll be a fitting tribute to the fallen hosts of the tournament, Brazil, who burned their tickets to the final, but so many times before have gone to faraway lands and conquered somebody else’s castle. Just what Argentina and Germany plan on doing today.

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The Final Insult

Netherlands’ Three-Punch
Knockout Finishes Brazil

The last possible achievement of the Brazilian national team, in the World Cup ending in Rio, was rudely snatched away by the Dutch: it gave Brazil yet another beating, 3X0, and once again left millions of fans, and a cast of players saddled with shame and sadness.
There were no redeeming qualities in the Seleção’s last stand, thoroughly trounced by a superior squad. The same that’d failed to defeat its biggest rival, Argentina, which will be playing the final against Germany. Brazilians do brace for the worst possible scenario.
World Cup 2014 LogoOnly in nightmares the country that so ambivalently embraced the cup, would have envisioned such a possibility of not being present at the big closing game, and also watching its neighbor stand a decent chance of being crowned right in its own backyard.
The Brazilian team now bidding farewell has amassed a miserable catalog of catastrophes in this edition. In a record for a semifinal game, it lost to Germany by the largest score in its history, suffered the most goals in a single tournament, and handed to them two coveted prizes: the most wins and the top scorer, Klose. More than a record, this looks like a rap sheet.
It’s now is expected to enter a long, dark night of disappointment and pain, as a new generation of brilliant players, as well as a new direction for its soccer model, will have to be nourished and nurtured long before it’ll be able to compete as an equal against other, better organized, teams. Would its five championships be next on the auction block?
Or, if you must, the beatings will continue till every point is driven home. It surely won’t happen next week, next year, and probably not even in the 2018 edition of the World Cup, in Russia. In the meantime, a little humbleness would go a long way, and it’d be useful to stop calling Brazilian football the best in the world, at least for a while.

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The Forgettable Game

Brazil & Netherlands,
Would-Be Champions

Some say it’s a match for honor, but it feels more like the game to save face. Every World Cup has one of these, and every four years, it serves only as the place and time to stage the deflated feelings of 22 men whose dreams were destroyed way too close to becoming reality.
As they drag themselves to fulfill a commitment, only the die-hard and the emotionally nearsighted will believe that there’s any purpose at stake. The Dutch may have been there one too many times, and Brazilians always equated third place to a shot at being last.
World Cup 2014 LogoNevertheless they will soldier on, bless their bleeding hearts, and many a time it’s been an entertaining clash. Something to do with nothing being worth anything any longer, or really, the last display of their fighting spirit, triggered by sheer sportsmanship.
It’s doubtful that anyone in the Netherlands takes the sobriquet, ‘best nation to have never won the cup,’ with any sense of pride. Which is a pity because they really have earned it. And this time they did started it all with a bang, thrashing the world champions, Spain. It was downhill from there.
As for the Brazilians, oh they’re still hurting alright, still reeling too much to care. The moving pictures that circled the world, of fans copiously weeping after Tuesday’s massacre by Germany, are still too fresh in everybody’s mind for them to be able to wipe the slate clean and put up another battle today.
The agony that both teams endured throughout the tournament will surely last even longer, as an entire generation of brilliant Dutch players will be retiring soon, and a whole set of assumptions by Brazilians about themselves, pulverized for good, will have to be replaced by a more realistic vision for the future.
Let’s hope, though, that at least for half an hour, players will rediscover the joy of football just for the sake of its beauty, and produce if not drama, then at least a few great moments to remember. After all, it’s the last time anyone will see them playing together as such. So it’ll be fitting for them to create a dignified farewell.

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Have a Ball

The World Cup Next
Door & From Far Afield

Brace yourself for withdrawal symptoms; it’ll be all over in just a few days. Even after all agony, nail biting till none was left, and much cursing at the TV, one can’t help it but start anticipating the crush of the end, which is nigh. The World Cup has spoiled us rot.
It may not have been the same since Team USA bowed out. It’ll be hard to see the whole U.S. so completely taken again by the explosion of cheers, jeers and untimely heartbreak, flags galore and packed bars all around. But we’re not quite done yet.
World Cup 2014 LogoWhat a difference a few cups have made. From 1990, when the sole network showing the games would break, American football style, for commercials, to now, when U.S. goalkeeper Tim Howard was rumored for a possible renaming of the Reagan Airport, in Washington, DC, it feels almost like another country.
The Super Bowl would never command such an arrested crowd, but this is nothing new around the world. Even in the middle of sparsely populated regions, in public plazas and shantytowns, by desert nomads and war refugees, people still found the time to watch the games.
In Europe, such gathering by the thousands rivaled in numbers big mass rallies, but the comparison must stop right there: while those taking the streets to demand social change may get beaten, football fans risked only disappointment. Thank goodness, no hooligans to report so far. Good riddance too.

For sure, not all is like a sweet block party, plenty of cake and no guns allowed. While those are now rare in America, the World Cup still feels like an extended holiday. Disgracefully, our team won’t be at the final, but even if yours will, you’re unlikely to be spared from feeling empty either, coming Monday morning.
Thus enjoy it while it lasts. Heaven knows that people in Bagdad, in Gaza, in Damascus, and in Mogadishu, Continue reading →

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National Tragedy


Germany Humiliates
Brazil at Home: 7X1

To say that this was a loss would be an insult to all teams that have lost during this and previous World Cups, despite fighting their hearts out and carrying their nations’ hopes. To say that it was about Brazil is also unfair to the great German squad. It was their win to celebrate.
But what did happen on this sad afternoon in Brazil was that reality has finally caught up with the Seleção Brasileira. Not just for what it’s shown during the tournament but for past decades of completely lack of preparation from the ground up, to protect its soccer traditions.
World Cup 2014 LogoFor since it has won the World Cup only 12 years ago, not a single Brazilian club has climbed the rankings among the world’s best, despite a few wins in the Intercontinental Cup, and the state of organized sports in Brazil has only got even more appalling, from the foundations of its business model to the very own field of games.
In fact, to watch a regular Brazilian league soccer game has become one of the most unpleasant and dangerous experiences for the fans, as well as a pathetic display of incivility, with so many illegal tackles and ugly bumps, to disgust even the most fervent supporter. And the state of the stadiums only enhances such perception.
So guess what team had the record number of faults in the World Cup? Even though it isn’t alone in allowing its players to fake injury to gain benefits from the referee, Brazil has been a shameful adept of the brutality on the field, and arguably the serious injury Neymar suffered was an involuntary payback by the Colombians.
The league is also one of the unfairest, forcing well supported teams to compete, and play, in under par fields all over the enormous country, for great part of the year. Many a time, a club simply refuses to be downgraded to a lower division, using political influence and the courts in lieu of the lack of quality of its soccer.

INGRAINED UNACCOUNTABILITY
Brazilian clubs also fester with mismanagement, corruption, traffic of influence, and behind-the-scenes deals with empresarios, who treat promising players like commodities and reap considerable, and mostly unreported, wealthy out of trading them to foreign leagues.
Finally, for a sport that mobilizes obscene amounts of money, club management in Brazil is mostly a cash and carry structure, with no accountability even as it’s supported by taxpayer money. Fans have little saying on the financial decisions of the clubs they support.
So, no wonder that when Brazil was chosen to host the World Cup, the first thing that was done by the Brazilian federation, CBF, was to map where the games would be played, not on the basis of infrastructure or tradition, but according to political favors owned and paid back to local bosses.
No wonder either that some of these extra multimillion dollar stadiums (at least three) that were built for the competition went over budget and will probably slowly decay Continue reading →

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The Pre-Final

Brazil & Germany Play
for a Place in History

So they meet again. After having never played each other in the World Cup for roughly 70 years, they made the 2002 final in Japan, with Brazil getting the best out of it. It’s taken Germany 12 years to have another crack at writing a new chapter on their competing legacies.
While for the Brazilians, that memorable night in Yokohama represented the apex of their soccer supremacy, winning a record fifth time the cup, for the Germans, there has never been a better chance than today to erase its bad taste with a victory in their opponent’s turf.
World Cup 2014 LogoThe two teams with the most wins in the competition, however, meet now under completely different circumstances. After all, this World Cup has shown a German squad with the usual resolve and efficiency, and a Brazilian one, plagued with all sorts of doubts and near misses.
While Germany has won with authority all but one of its games in the previous rounds, Brazil’s struggled to find its center, barely surviving false starts, penalty shootouts, and the catastrophic loss of its main player, Neymar. So at least on paper, the odds are in Germany’s favor.
But, without getting into that oft-told tale of science and the bumblebee, as many a Brazilian would love to remind you, in football, as in life, the best not always finishes first. Or whatever they’re telling each other as we speak, in order to keep their wits about it. For more, read below.
The vagaries of making predictions is that, even when one gets it somewhat right, it’s usually due to factors that were unknown at the time of the prediction. Stating the obvious, both teams are perfectly capable of delivering the fatal blow to each other, so we won’t be crazy to guess the winner.

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Finger-Crossed Nation

With Due Respect to Germany,
If Brazil Loses It’s All Our Fault

Just about now, some 200 million Brazilians are deep into their strategic planning for Brazil vs. Germany, the game in Belo Horizonte that will define the World Cup’s first semifinalist. They are not, however, concerned about partying or commiserating afterwards.
They’ll instead be carefully deciding exactly what outfit to wear and just about every other detail related to the viewing experience, down to repeating everything they did during Brazil’s past wins. Make no mistake about it: whatever happens, they’ll feel responsible for it.
World Cup 2014 LogoThat’s how viscerally Brazilians try to take ownership of sorts over fate, when it comes to their national football team, even though for everyone else, it’s just a purely human, vain attempt to feel in charge over something that’s essentially out of anyone’s control. Good luck telling them that, though.
For that’s entirely in line with a nation that, until a few years back, used to be know for the biggest concentration of Catholics in the world, outside Italy. Such assumption sounds now as hollow as long ago demoted definitions of Brazil as a ‘racial democracy,’ or the ‘country of the future.’
The hidden truth about that old cliche was that, even as most still call themselves Christians, Afro-Brazilian cults and their deities, brought to the land by slaves, has always exerted a stronger pull over the faithful and whenever Jesus wouldn’t hear them, the Orixás would come to rescue. In doubt, most would worship both.
On top of that, since the 1970s, there’s been a dramatic increase in Messianic Evangelical faiths, that’s slowly taken hold of Brazil and now has enormous consolidated power over all aspects of society, from media ownership to political representation, which translates in massive wealth to its preachers.

TILL PRAYER (& MACUMBA) DO US APART
Using an appropriately religious expression, they’re ‘all united in faith,’ or something, anything, that will make them believe that devout ardor beats the basic randomness of nature, the one that presides over polls results, pregnancies, and of course, games of football. Somehow, these two forces always collide.
That is, unless there’s corruption, traffic of influence, and downright theft playing a part too. We honestly doubt though that it has any sway over the final stages of a competition of such a magnitude as the World Cup, however hard some may try to imply that it does. Then again, who knows?
But cliches about Brazil’s mysticism and the passion of its people for the game are but a small part Continue reading →

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Brazil Hurts


Thanks for the Memories
& Get Better Soon, Neymar

When it happened, few thought it was more than theatrics of a player whose skills with the ball are at par with his street smarts: minutes from the end of Brazil’s win over Colombia, Neymar got hit by Juan Zuniga’s knee, in a collision that fractured one of the striker’s lower back vertebrae and ended the World Cup at home for him.
World Cup 2014 LogoIt was a brutal shock for the #10 and for the Brazilian team which, to many, had already been placing too big a responsibility over his shoulders. And it happened just when the Seleção needs to pull itself together to face 3-time world champion Germany on Tuesday. In all fairness, the extremely painful but not career-ending injury, was a high price for Neymar to pay for a victory in which he was barely a factor.
Still, his absence may be a gap too large to fill. Brazil is now confronted with a dilemma that almost no one saw coming: either to overcome the odds, warts and all, and quell the virtually impossible expectations of a whole nation, with two final, redeeming victories. Or find comfort (and the perfect excuse) in falling for the circumstances, and to a worthy adversary.
In either case, both Brazil and Neymar will lose, of course, just as football in general, and this cup in particular, will miss the brilliance of a James Rodriguez, from Colombia, or of a Cristiano Ronaldo, from Portugal. Regardless; at 26, Neymar should be in top form for the 2018 games in Russia. Once again, Brazil will surely count on him. Till then, so long, get well, and thanks for the wonderful moments.

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Fearsome Foursome

Europe & South America Pick
First World Cup Semifinalists

France and Germany, former champions, open the quarter finals today in Rio, to decide which is the first European team to move ahead.
World Cup 2014 LogoThe Germans, who won the last of their three cups in 1990, have had their share of travails but get to Maracanã Stadium with an intact killer instinct, as far as striker Muller is concerned. Also, as the core of this team has played together for at least four years, their collective will and tradition to overcome challenges may be a tough sell for the Blues.
France, which since its own win in Paris, in 1998, has been a shadow of its former glory, seems to have reawaken a fighting spirit badly misused in 2006, and completely lost four years ago in South Africa. For the French, this has been Benzema’s cup to win, and he’s a serious contender to the tournament’s top scorer.
Brazil and Colombia match skills for the first time in the World Cup, in Fortaleza. As with the Europeans, there’s no favorite to move forward.
The Colombians may have the edge, though, for their exuberant style of playing and the skills of 22-year old James Rodriguez, who leads the board of the competition, with five goals. He may as well have the game of a lifetime today. With a superior record than the hosts so far, there’s no lack of confidence that this may be their time to shine.
Brazilians, however, are under so much pressure that some of them cracked after narrowly beating Chile on penalty kicks, last week. Even a psychologist was called, supposedly for last-minute counseling. But a team that counts with its own 22-year old, Neymar, simply can’t be underestimated. It may be just a matter of getting him the ball.

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The Scream Is Over

The Biggest of the Little Guys
Gets Bounced Off the World Cup

The World Cup has always been a lot of things to a lot of people. In fact, for millions of Americans, there could hardly be anything more important happening this Tuesday than the game that Team USA was playing against Belgium in the Brazilian city of Salvador.
But the cup is a brutal place for underdogs. Despite its cathartic explosion of goals, already exceeding previous editions, it also has a predatory taste for heartbreak. Thus when Lukaku scored and kicked out the U.S. from the tournament, millions of dreams were crushed.
World Cup 2014 Logo copyThe unprecedented crowds that overwhelmed bars, clubs and eateries throughout the States were absolutely sure that this was not going to be Belgium, even if it was Tuesday, and cheered and screamed and dared to imagine victory until what felt like a sucker punch in the gut.
The deafening silence that followed the referee’s final whistle would moved to tears even the hardest Neocon, or those known for despising beggars and Greenpeace activists. The 2X1 score was even more disappointing because, as it’s often the case, the U.S. was so close to tying it, so close to overwhelming it.
It wasn’t to be. Not that this is unfamiliar territory for the only major nation on the planet that calls football soccer, where the great majority still prefers to follow its insulated brand of league sports, and whose notion of a global ball competition involves exclusively its Northern neighbor.
There’s no need to act so sourly about Jürgen Klinsmann’s choices. After all, the current cycle of sunspots is also not what it’d been cracked up to be, scientists say. So if even the billions-old shiner can afford an off cycle or two, so can Clint Dempsey and his mates. And so can we all.
Which doesn’t mean that Team USA’s ride wasn’t thrilling, as it’s been for at least three consecutive World Cups, and that they haven’t given their very best, which it’s also been the case for the longest while. Then again, you can say the same about pretty much every ‘little’ team that never makes it to the final.

EVERY BIT A FLAMING TRAIL
For there hasn’t been a single case of a fragile team winning it all in this almost century old tournament, including the big guys, when they play a notch below their historical best. Continue reading →

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South American Duels

World Cup 2014 LogoWorld Cup Enters
Its Unforgiving Stage

Chile X Brazil

Alexis Sanchez has an oversize task on his shoulders, as Chile will try to beat Brazil at home, and reverse a bitter history of three World Cup final defeats, including one in Santiago, in 1962. As for Neymar, this may be his most defining moment yet, to either send Brazilians home or on to the next thriller.

Colombia has been beating all odds and may accomplish today what none of its previous national teams have done: getting to the final eight. For Uruguay, on the other hand, only a victory will erase the huge bloody stain left by its serial biter, Luis Suarez, who may never play another World Cup again.

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Rant & Cave (in)

A Brazilian’s Irrational Fear of
Argentina Winning the World Cup

They’ve called Porto Alegre the Argentine capital. As my love-hate for that city loses its balance, I can only muster, SHAME! Worse, they said it’s all the color blue’s fault. CHEATERS! I know who’s behind it: Big Red Internacional, who always dreamed of owning the color of the sky.
The game against Nigeria was the perfect excuse to do so (to humble us again, the cretins). While they took over the city, only to stage one more of their wins, we were being told that the old, vicious, healthy Brazil-Argentina rivalry was being called off, at least for now.
World Cup 2014 LogoThen there are those claiming that cheering for Messi is rooting for beautiful football, and that in the end, it’s all for the common good of South America, you know, hermanos and all that. They don’t fool me, magnanimous phonies; I know what they’re after and it’s not the brotherhood of man.
It’s all done to mortify us, Grêmio supporters. The blue-covered Beira Rio stadium on TV, which thanks to ‘Colorado‘-lover President Rousseff, (there you go, Dilma-haters), has usurped the cup games from the Grêmio Arena, it gave me a funny knot in my throat. Not many red shirts amidst that iced blue sea.
Well, I didn’t spot a striped jersey of the ‘Musketeer‘ one either, even thought some Southerners do consider themselves more ‘gaúchos’ than ‘cariocas,’ which is how the Hispanic networks used to call them little Canaries (they’ve stopped now, it seems). Again, no one use the bird’s name for the Brazilian team anymore.

A TAINTED FEELING LIVES ON
I too was an Argentinophile once, at least culturally, up to the time of their military coup. But a lot of what I still admire about the ‘Platenses,’ Piazzolla, Borges, the pain of lost souls, have always been a cherished part of me, way more than the Carnival in Rio. Now, wear the shirt? I’d rather get lost at La Boca.
I’d wear the Netherlands‘ beautiful blue jersey, though, or even Ivory Coast’s. (Funny that I used to like the Santos FC white uniform, but I think it was religious coercion then.) All the blue I’ve always loved never included the Alvi-Celeste, the one that battered us so badly through the years.
Specially when worn by that evil genius, dark soul Maradona. Again, rooting for him is like rooting for football, et al. I don’t sell myself that cheap. It just makes me jealous, of course, not of them having had him and having Messi now. But for me being absent while the Dutch cover in orange Portinho, which is also how no one calls Porto Alegre anymore.
I’ll live, though. Too creaky to turn down my deep-seated ‘principles.’ No, not humanity, universal love, or goodwill toward human brotherhood. I’ve traded those a long time ago, probably in exchange for some instant and temporary thrill. Continue reading →

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Cold Cups II

The Fan Who Sold His Honor & the
World Cup Coach Who Can’t Drive

Even if Fifa were a model of probity, which recent allegations have shown it clearly is not, or street rallies against its costs had cooled off with the start of the games, which they haven’t, the World Cup in Brazil has already provided a whole plethora of political drama.
From the multicultural bleachers to the quarrels over refereeing, from the quality of the grass drainage to antiaircraft artillery on civilian buildings, matches and goals have been thrilling, for sure, but what’s going on beyond the pitch may as well upstage it all.
As Brazilians protest the money bacchanal, brokered by Fifa and funded by its mega sponsors, and the competition heats up with record goals and relatively few surprises so far, one wonders whether there’s even space on the coverage for anything else. As it turns out, we make room for just that sort of thing.
For appalling mistakes committed by field officials are as much a part of the game as its players’ cheap theatrics, and with all certainty, will remain the theme of late night, heated discussions over tears and beers for years to come. It’s what’s not so obvious, though, that we’re most interested.
Thus, while that Barcelona star may be executing a perfect curvy free kick, out of sight and in the middle of a sea of multicolored tribute jerseys, someone may be giving a whole country a black eye, or a sympathetic one, by just flicking their wrist. At times, cameras may capture the moment but mostly, they may miss it.
And, just as life itself, the so called ‘teaching moments’ go beyond the walls of these temples of football, or through another march against high ticket prices on a street nearby. World Cup-related news, not so breaking but weird just the same, may be happening right across from the stadium, atop some apartment building.
The reach of this tournament may have a surprising sway both at the confluence of sports and morality, and as far as some court decision across the ocean. Coming July 13, regardless of who’ll lift the trophy, we’ll have gone through a common experience of such a planetary scale that each of these stories may count as much as the goals scored.
And you may thank your lucky shirts for we’re skipping altogether anything about the tragic Nigeria blast, that killed several people (in a replay of Uganda four years ago, remember?) or the Mexican drugpin who got nabbed by the Feds after he bought a ticket to the World Cup… on his own name. Smart.

GREED & CIVILITY AT THE STANDS
Speaking of most Brazilians, they may be fighting the good fight against corruption, but apparently José Humberto Martins is yet to get the memo. Last week in Natal, he was one of the thousands wearing a plastic poncho during the rain soaked Mexico vs. Cameroon game.
According to his own account, at some point, he was approached by a drenched tourist who offered to buy his cheap garment, unaware it was on sale for $14 elsewhere at the stadium. Not one to let the chance to make a buck pass, torrential pouring notwithstanding, José agreed to sell it on the spot: for $200!
The good name of soccer fans everywhere was rescued from the mud the following day, though, Continue reading →

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Mexico ‘Beats’ Brazil: 0X0

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Heart & Ball

Soccer Bumps
& Best Practices

Sudden cardiac deaths increase during the World Cup, according to studies published before the 2010 tournament in Africa. But some may beg to differ and the wisdom of such studies could be er compromised upon learning what happened to one of the researchers, a long distance runner.
The International Journal of Cardiology reported then a 77 percent spike in heart fatalities, while The New England Journal of Medicine found emergencies to be 2.66 times greater during a cup than before or after it. ‘Beta-adrenergic-blocking’ drugs are recommended to prevent such untimely fate.
Which was, nevertheless, exactly the fate met by the aforementioned researcher (name undisclosed). Despite being in top shape, he collapsed and died suddenly in one of his daily runs. Guess who found his lifeless body? Two smokers, who were leaving a soccer game and probably lit up another one before calling for help.
So if you think you could use some downers, by all means, go ahead and help yourself. You may then watch the 1958 World Cup final, minus the stressful twists and turns of that crazy teenager named Pelé. But if you rather shoot yourself in the arm than miss the final in Rio de Janeiro, you’d better listen to Branco, another Brazilian World Champion, class of 1994.
Branco Scores Against the Netherlands, 20 Years Ago July 9th, Dallas, U.S.The defender, who scored a crucial goal for his side against the Netherlands, told the press that his son was conceived in the U.S. during that cup. According to the sage, “sex is good for you, it relieves tension.” Amen to that, Mr. White.
So it may be time to put aside the research papers and wish you’ll be one of those lucky blokes who’ll die, heart-pumping hard, either when your team is winning or in the sack. Tell no soul but some say that’s what happened to soccer-loving Peter Sellers. Whatta boy.
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* Edited from post originally published on June, 14, 2010.

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Brazil 3X1 Croatia

Not Pretty.

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Cold Cups I

Fads & Ads Compete for
Another World Cup Score

Once the ball starts rolling in São Paulo tomorrow, not everything will be about football. It hasn’t for over a year now, if you’ve been following the street protests in Brazil, as it hasn’t ever been about the game only as long as, well, Fifa remains in charge.
Thus, as much attention will be paid to players’ skills as to their ability to sell wares with their bodies, attire, and hairstyles. Cynics may even say that what’s at stake is not who’ll win the World Cup, but which sportswear company will sell the most: Nike or Adidas.
Increasingly, what soccer stars wear and endorse has indeed driven revenues of sport and designer goods, along with their personal tastes for tattoos and haircut styles. We can’t really end this sentence without mentioning David Beckham, the retired British player.
But while Becks has the physique of a natural born model, and his commercial appeal is only enhanced for his pop-star turned into stylist wife, many others have distinguished themselves for personal choices so ugly esthetically speaking, that they become iconic just the same.
Case in point: Brazil’s Ronaldo Nazário’s hairstyle at the final of the 2002 World Cup in Japan. He scored all the goals and his team won the trophy, but that ‘triangular island’ of hair on top of his otherwise shaved head captured more than its share of advertising’s prime real estate.
No wonder it leads the New York Times Hairdo Hall of Fame now. But enough of your hair, what about shoes, Imelda Marcos? My, haven’t you heard, dahling? red is the new black. Or orange. Or any color but black. We should’ve heeded a certain pontiff’s personal taste; just saying.
A FORMER POPE’S FASHION FANCY
As it turned out, we greatly underestimated ex-Pope Benedict and his exquisite choice of foot attire. He was only foreseeing the future, you see – the one presided over by current soccer-crazy Pope Francisco – when flaunting the most famous pair of red shoes this side of Dorothy.
Now in Brazil, word is that every soccer star worth his fashion endorsements will display a pair of colorful shoes, sometimes one for each foot, matching jersey or hair die optional. And the crowds have gone wild over them. Black shoes? Only if you’re a referee.
Purists may decry this lack of substance that threatens to take away the sport’s very own vitality in the name of fads, which by definition and unlike soccer legacies, are not built to last. But there’s no denying: athletes have been selling wares since way before Beckham sported a Mohawk. Does anyone remember Colombian Carlos Walderana’s do, at the U.S. World Cup in 1994? The Hairdo Hall of Fame surely does.
For footballers themselves (and here we stop a long-running fancy of misnaming an American ballgame and give back the name football, at least during the month-long tournament, to soccer as it’s already known by billions around the world), it’s more than an extra income. Many have turned their Continue reading →

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The Horse’s Mouth

Ridiculous Predictions
for a World Cup Winner

So everyone and their second cousins have their own system to fathom what’s by definition unpredictable: who’ll win the World Cup. Obviously, only a certified fool would risk squandering what’s little left of their personal street cred by offering their own stupid guesses. Here’s our certified fool’s stupid guesses.
As with any completely unscientific research worth its dirty test tubes, a credible-looking set of predictions has to have some semblance of a rationale animating the proceedings, along with its mostly random elements of pure insanity. That’s why we’ve added the always reliable, and certainly ancient, Chinese horoscope.
Completely arbitrarily, we’ve created a point rate system by attributing an order of relevance to each team’s credentials: the number of World Cup wins, 1.5 point each, home advantage, 0.5 point, continental advantage, 0.5 point, reigning champion status, 1 point, and 1 point for each year the team won under the Year of Horse, which is the Chinese sign for 2014.
In 19 editions of the cup, the number of wins has been a consistent indicator of success; single winners won only three times. Hosting has equaled six victories. Europe and South America have split championships and, in South Africa, Europe took the lead.
Reigning champions have won twice in a roll only two times, but this was our way of tempering with the system, and add value to Spain’s current status. 2014 marks the seventh World Cup under the ‘influence’ of the Horse, the seventh sign of the Chinese horoscope (whooo, drum roll and all that).
This year’s sign was the same for 1930 (Uruguay Continue reading →

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The Whirled Cup

Five Bullet Points On Brazil

& a Split-Decision to Strike

World Cup 2014 LogoYou may not know this but to most past World Cup hosts, the occasion was for national joy and jubilation, if not much for settling social scores. Brazil, though, is not buying into that placid template: in case you haven’t got the memo, Brazilians are actually angry.
They may have a point. But apart from all disturbing news about the (poor) preparations for the world’s biggest sports event that starts next week in São Paulo, here are five curiosities that go from the promising to the ‘peculiar’ to the far out.
We’ll get to them. But about that anger and the unsettling news: yes, it’s all true. The most expensive World Cup in history may turn out to be, arguably, the turnaround for Brazil’s dreams of being perceived as a global power, capable of handling its moment in the spotlight with composure.
A quick review of the staggering numbers shows that Brazilians are paying between $13 to $18 billion for the right to stage the games, but most of it has been invested either in riches that will quickly evaporate from the country, coming August, or will rot in some stadia built in the middle of nowhere.
Over 200 thousand people have been displaced to accommodate infrastructure projects for the cup and for the 2016 Olympic Games, also to take place in Brazil, according to a Mother Jones infographic, but many of such projects may not be finished for the opening kickoff, or may remain incomplete forever.
Discontent with the way funds have been diverted from needed and more permanent works, and public perception that President Dilma Rousseff hasn’t been fully cognizant to how Brazilians feel left out of the big party, have taken the country by storm and may only get louder during the cup.
In fact, she does seem less concerned about them than how the massive street rallies critical to what was supposed to be a celebration of Brazilians’ passion for the game, will impact the estimated one billion worldwide, expected to follow the month long competition.
But even as those problems have been called out over and over, and may be inseparable from the games this time around, it doesn’t mean we’re not working hard to provide you with some interesting alternatives to experience it all, insights that may be unique to this particular edition. And here they are:
1. THE WALKING STEAD
Talking about the opening kickoff, few know that, technically, it won’t be given by a human foot. Or it’ll but not exactly how one’d expect it. If all goes well, on June 12, a paralyzed person will walk on the field wearing an exoskeleton created by Brazilian neuroscientist Miguel Nicolelis.
The technology behind the mind-controlled full-body suit has the potential to revolutionize mobility for millions of people. It’s not the first time that robotics is applied this way, but it still scores a kick in the arse of common indignities associated with being handicapped.
No word yet on who’ll be walking towards the middle of the Arena Corinthians and, with a thought or two, command the suit to help the foot kick the Brazuca. But you can bet your soccer shoes that, for many around the world, it’ll be as historical as the tournament’s winning goal.

2. WELCOME TO FAVELA INN
Some six million soccer fans are expected for the games, the last of them probably on their way in as we speak. But so is a severe hotel room shortage, with prices upwards of $380 a night to boot. So what choices a late comer has to rest their tired bones and avoid crashing in some godforsaken public square?
What about a shantytown? For a bargain $30, one can find a place to stay in one of the thousands of tiny houses, cramped together like jigsaw pieces, in one of Brazil’s hundreds of favelas, conveniently located in most state capitals and often with a much better ocean view than many a pricy hotel.
After all, this is a country where the so-called informal economy Continue reading →

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Out of This World (Cup)

Ecstasy to a Precious Few

& Agony for the Rest of Us

Time to face the inevitable: to pick a wrong team and bet the farm that your dreams won’t go south. In about two weeks, the World Cup will kick off in Brazil and the host, plus 31 other nations, will spend a month chasing a soccer ball through grit till glory.
Two will book a ticket to the July 13 final in Rio, and out of some 400 players expected to step on the grass, they may count with one or two of a group of eight outstanding talents to fulfill, or deflate, the hopes of millions of their comrades.
The history of this tournament may as well be written by the feet of Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo, Argentina’s Messi, Spain’s Iniesta, Brazil’s Neymar, Italy’s Balotelli, Netherlands’ Robben, France’s Ribery and Chile’s Sanchez, or by the drive, team work, and ultimately sheer luck of everyone else.
The cup is capricious, though, and make a hero out of some unknown buck, instead, who’ll score that untimely goal, make an unlikely play, and provide the fleeting moment of suspended time when the ball succeeds in kissing the net. Between that kiss and the stadium explosion that follows it, lives the world’s most popular sport.
Short of divining who’ll be the winner, we once again embark on the vain exercise of establishing what we know, hoping that what we don’t, doesn’t bite us on our behind. In fact, it’s our duty to toss the dice and look ahead, despite all reasoning to the contrary.
A Colltales reader wrote so sensibly that ‘even the worst teams in the world have their faithful, and emotionally, masochistic followers.’ But if asked, one wouldn’t get such a straight assessment of their own misery, but all sorts of rational and, really, no nonsensical arguments to the contrary.
You won’t get a straight assessment about the outlook for this cup here either. Rather, I’ll switch to a single voice, so to allow myself to be entirely partial, deeply biased, and at times, completely irrational. You may get some useful hints, though, at least about how this game turns temporarily insane half of the world’s population.
WISHING UPON A STAR OR TWO
For starters, let’s get something out of the way: not to dismiss world champions Spaniards, but they have already peaked and, as last year’s Confederations Cup final has proved, they’re beatable. I’m not wishing for Brazil to cross paths with them again, but there are a number of teams that can knock them out early and often.

Talking about aging squads, if this cup were in Europe, Germany would be a natural fit to take it all once again. But for the fact that they strive under hard conditions and this group of players has been performing at its best for several years now, I’m not sure in the whole it still remains a suitable match to younger teams, though. Or to the grind of their own group, which in any case, they’re expected to win.
Italy and France are two tiresome mysteries too, but for radically different reasons. Piro & Balotelli notwithstanding, the Italians seem a fatigued bunch, and their schematics on the pitch will be hardly effective against the more agile contenders on their way. France, on the other hand, is a mystery because it’s failed to renew itself, since the sorely missed times of Zidane, headbutting and all.
In fact, the bureaucracy that took hold of European national teams, in opposite to their vibrant clubs, is baffling. Or anyone thinks that Belgians, Greeks, Austrians, Russians and the Swiss have something up their sleeves to shock the world? Puzzlingly, such lack of enthusiasm is echoed by the Africans, too. Long ago, Cameroon, Ghana and Nigeria, specially, used to be a refreshing sight. Now they seem er European. Something happened on their way to the big leagues.
The malaise had already defeated the Dutch four years ago, but a former French colony, Ivory Coast, may hold some promise of Continue reading →

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The Woes Cup

Eleven Fouls in Brazil
That Deserve a Red Card

Among many overinflated sobriquets Brazilians attach to their passion for soccer, ‘the country of futebol,’ which is how the game’s know there, has some truth to it. The only team to have won five times and never missed the World Cup has something to do with it.
But another cliche about football makes sense too: the saying that it’s evolved only within the pitch. For all the exuberance and sophistication of Brazil’s game and culture, beyond the green rectangle, everything else may be as rot as a political dynasty of a banana republic.
Yes, Brazilians are crazy about the filigranes and the curve kicks, the euphoric pass and the gravity-defying goal. But about what it takes to make a street play into a tool for social change, not so much. It’s not their fault, but then again, to some extent, it most surely is.
As many sleepless aficionados agonize about the chances for the national team, the Seleção Brasileira, of winning it all, for a growing segment of the population, the cup won’t change anything, or bring an iota of relief to the daily grind of a still underachieving nation.
Thus we prepared another seleção, of mainly old foes that always stand in the way of Brazil reaching its potential future of land of opportunity to its citizens. To make it instructive and have some fun with it, we associated each of these ‘players’ to real positions in a soccer team.
Defenders, middle-fielders and attackers will be surely engaged during the cup and beyond, doing what they’ve done for ages: preventing fair play, a level field, a clean slate and a win for all. They’re the formidable enemies of Brazil, whether or not it wins the trophy.
One last thing about that: no one knows why Brazilians care so much about the World Cup. The fact that it was chosen to host it for the second time goes way beyond settling old scores; by the looks of it, it’ll be another sad miss, regardless of any magic that Neymar & Co. may bring to the fore.
THE 11 PLAYS TO LOSE
Let’s start with the goalkeeper, Maracanazo. That’s how Brazil’s first national soccer tragedy became known, when it lost the final of the 1950 World Cup to Uruguay, at Rio’s Maracanã Stadium, then the world’s biggest, a disappointment five world titles haven’t erased.
Playing defense, familiar foes: Crime Play has always been there, committed by underpaid cops and gang members; Pollution Kick was raised by untreated sewage, carbon emissions, and lack of infrastructure investments. It’s also related to Traffic Jam, a big player in Brazil’s cities, always ready to clog arteries.
Sex Tourism has for too long been Brazil’s dark side of its supposedly upbeat culture. The fear is not about the socially aware sex workers, but pedophiles and child predators, expected to descend in mass and incognito to Brazil. A dirty and despicable player.
Middle fielder Lethal Accidents has been responsible for a dozen deaths of workers at World Cup construction sites, and it’s wreaking havoc in Brazil’s rising, and invisible, illegal immigrant demographic. Unfortunately, safety and decent labor conditions are still aliens for the current building boom.

FROM MIDDLE TO THE END
Attacking midfielders Blackwater Pass and White Elephant are an odd pair. The infamous U.S.-based war contractor group has been hired by the already truculent Brazilian police and one may expect widespread tragic clashes with civilians. By the way, have you seen the new Robocops to be deployed during the cup?
White Elephant will dot the land as totems to excess and absurd expenditures. Brazil’s building, or reforming, 13 venues, or at least five too many, according to those who saw what happened in Greece, after the Olympic Games: built in cities without even soccer teams, they’re destined to turn into skeletons.

The attack of this team is unlikely to play the jogo bonito associated with the Seleção. Take Cost Overrun, for instance. The most expensive World Cup in history will set Brazil back over $13.7 billion, an amount enough to have put together the Continue reading →

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Kicking the Cup

Cheap Comparisons
& Annoying Gestures

The World Cup in Brazil starts in little over a month and, while been plagued by protests, construction delays, worker fatalities and unsurprising fears that the only winner will be Fifa, the world soccer federation, no one doubts that it’ll succeed in the final.
How well, though, both to its host and to lovers of the game, is not nearly as sure. The world’s most popular sport has changed, not always for the best and, again unsurprisingly, money is now a major destabilizing factor.
We’ll dedicate part of our coverage (what do you mean we shouldn’t? we’re crazy too, you know?) to these and other factors, and try to keep up the level of interest in the game with our own take on its beauty and its ugliness. It also helps that we’ve been there before.
Even if the tournament’s last edition, four years ago in Nelson Mandela’s South Africa, was arguably almost uneventful, there were plenty of thrilling stories, drama and, of course, goals to lift our spirits (and ultimately, break our hearts) to write about, before, during and after.
Thus, just as record five-time winner, and second-time host, Brazil announced its squad for the month-long competition that starts June 12, along with most of the other 31 teams, we kick off our own coverage with a little intro, to set the tone and themes for the weeks ahead. Enjoy.
CLICHÉS & CLUTCHES
One of the most painful, unimaginative and plain dumb clichés applied to soccer is to call it a religion, the Church of Maradona in Buenos Aires not withstanding. Or a passion. Or, for that matter, to use war metaphors to characterize it, by comparing teams to armies, and players to warriors.
But as once a young musician compared rock and roll to religion, to dire consequences, I’m about to go on a limb here and express what’s already in most people’s minds: soccer is more popular than religion. There, I said it.
All it takes is to count the number of people who’ll be watching the opening ceremony for the games to, for example, any given Christmas Midnight Mass at the Vatican,  the exquisitely dressed Cardinals all around and the full regalia of the Michelangelo-designed guard uniforms, regardless that the new Pope is not expected to wear the former’s gender-bending red shoes.
Or let’s forget all about pomp and ceremony. What about the opening game between the host and Croatia? Or Friday the 13th’s rematch of the 2010 final, between current champion Spain and the Netherlands? Or any other game Continue reading →

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Grace Under Rain


The World Cup starts in June in Brazil, the country that has won it five times, the most of any other. Three of such conquests are fully owned by Edson Arantes do Nascimento, Pelé, the game’s top scorer and, arguably, the greatest player who’s ever played it.
Back in the 1960s, as a wee fan I got a taste of his magic and seized that memory as one of my most precious. Four years ago, I’ve committed that virtually indescribable experience to words and now, I’m sharing it with you as a personal tribute to Pelé. Enjoy it.

As he walked off the field, head down, oblivious, the crowd jeers turned into cheers. He waited until they grew louder and finally acknowledged us like the king he already was. It took him a second and we were all his forever.

Pelé, football’s greatest player, had come to my hometown to play against my team. The rough first half had just ended, with no fancy plays or memorable greatness. Just another mid-week league game, in a cold and unforgiving winter. No other redeeming memory to speak of.
But no ordinary knight was among us that night. And he acted the part with style.
Sport fans are rude, raw, irrational the world over. Crude emotions always trace them, but civility is left out at the turnstiles. Just like at the Parthenon: Christians and pagans crowd the pit but to the beasts belongs the hour.
The land of the “jogo bonito” is no exception in this world of unbounded brutality. The exquisite touch of skills, the artistry with the ball have their own bizarro mirror reflected at the bleaches, all screams and cursing and obscene gestures to match.
Let’s not get into the urine-bag throwing at random, the foul smelling bathrooms, the fights that break at chance between rivaling factions. And the slurs throw at women, let’s just not go there.
In such a cold and raining Wednesday, as only a place too close to Antarctica can be, 30 thousand or so of us were braving elements and
Continue reading →

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Brazuca

World Cup Groups Set, a Weary
Brazil Braces for the June Kickoff

The last regulation act before the start of next summer’s World Cup in Brazil took place yesterday: the tournament’s group drawing and first round schedule. It was pretty much one of the few things that happened on schedule. All else is far from running as smooth.
In fact, all six stadiums being built or redone for the games will miss the December deadline, despite staggering costs (and so far, two casualties). Thus, if one could name a single thing that, for sure, will be doing its part, even if all else fails, that’d be the ball.
But apart from that, an engineering feat named Brazuca, Brazilians remain weary about this tournament, despite their now proverbial, and much manipulated, passion for ‘futebol,’ and of course, that it’s taking place in their land. Not many more reasons to celebrate, otherwise.
In June, dissatisfied with the way billions of dollars were being spent with the cup, while a decrepit network of hospitals and chronically underfunded schools were left to rot, hundreds of thousands took to the streets in mass rallies not seen since the 1980s, when similar crowds effectively ended 20-plus years of military dictatorship.
Such dissatisfaction continues to brew, and by the time the ball starts to roll, pent up anger may be virtually impossible to contain. Some expect that a Brazil win could quell such feelings. Others are not so sure. In fact, while many think a win would be great, nice and all that, there seems to be a better sense of proportion this time around.

READY FOR AN UPSET?
Feeling they’ve been taken for a ride, which is reflected in every aspect of FIFA’s fingers on the setup of the games, from the way the competition is being sold to big wig sponsors to ticket prices, prohibitive to most locals, organizers may not have a clear idea what’s coming on their way.
The case of last month’s spectacular collapse in São Paulo, Brazil’s biggest city, of the multi-million dollar, overbudget stadium that’s to host the cup opener, which killed two workers and caused significant Continue reading →