A team that is dragging itself in sixth place on the way to the 2026 World Cup. A negative record: the first defeat at home in the South American Qualifiers. A new technical director, converted to emergency plan A, after the refusal of the main candidate. An absence due to injury of their icon player of the last 10 years. A starting player under investigation for betting. A style of play in reconstruction, far from its shining times. It seems like the presentation of a team condemned to mediocre performance in the 2024 Copa América, but it is the eternal candidate, Brazil, the only five-time world champion and the most seductive team in history.
Because furthermore, and despite the doubts it has accumulated in recent months, Brazil always presents its own, distinctive cards, and will show them again in the United States. To one already recognized throughout the world, an imperial Vinicius in Real Madrid that won the Champions League at the beginning of this month, is added the emergence of the new promise of football, Endrick, a 17-year-old forward who has just leave Palmeiras and that he will also be a teammate of Vini – and Kylian Mbappé – in the Spanish club after the Copa América. After the debut in Group D against Costa Rica on Monday the 24th and the second match against Paraguay on Friday the 28th, Brazil’s real measure will be seen on Tuesday, July 2 against Colombia.
The knockout blow against Croatia in the quarterfinals of Qatar 2022, when Brazil was eliminated for the fifth consecutive time against European rivals before reaching the World Cup final, marked the end of the cycle of Tité, a coach who between 2016 and 2022 had restored football confidence to a country devastated after the 1-7 defeat against Germany in the 2014 World Cup. Under his leadership, which had 80% efficiency – with no correspondence in the 2018 and 2022 World Cups -, the five-time champions of the world they won their only Copa América in the last 15 years, in 2019.
The Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) tried to replace him with the Italian Carlo Ancelotti, the coach of Real Madrid, and even announced it in mid-2023. In the middle, during what seemed like a transition, Fernando Diniz, the coach, took over for six games. Successful Brazilian coach with his attacking and ball-possessing Fluminense. But while Diniz led the Flu to its first Copa Libertadores, in parallel with the national team he added two historic defeats, against Uruguay in Montevideo – the first after 37 Brazil games without losses in the Qualifiers -, and against Argentina in the Maracaná – a setback without precedent for the “canarinha” in the 64 games played at home since 1954 in World Cup qualifications. Pending the resumption of the journey in 2026, in September, Brazil occupies an unusual sixth place.
When it became clear that Ancelotti would never cross the ocean, and Brazil looked like that groom who waits in vain for his partner at the altar, the CBF fired Diniz and in January 2024 announced the arrival of the other fashionable coach in local football, although with a different style, Dorival Júnior, 62 years old. Recent champion of the Copa Libertadores with Flamengo in 2022 and the Copa Brasil with Sao Paulo in 2023, he is a classic and conservative coach who was once called “feijão con arroz” in reference to the basic food of the Brazilian people. –beans with rice-: a coach who does what is simple, without major tactical innovations, but who transmits security to the players.
Even in the midst of uncertainty, the first two games of the Dorival Júnior cycle, in March, left positive feelings: victory against England in London and a draw against Spain in Madrid. With Neymar absent due to a torn cruciate ligament since last October and inactive until August, the lights in the United States will fall on Vinicius, who has not yet shone in the Brazilian team as he did in Real Madrid but who in his country is still idolized by his ongoing fight against racism. He is followed by Endrick, a young man with his own star who at 17 years old already scored goals at Wembley and the Santiago Bernabéu and who in the Copa América will wear the number 9 shirt, Ronaldo’s historic one. 10 will be for Rodrygo, also from Real Madrid.
Meanwhile, in the midfield and defense, Brazil no longer boasts the historical references that it had in its past, but no situation is more confusing than that of midfielder Lucas Paquetá, from England’s West Ham, suspected of betting manipulation in the Premier League. As reported by the English Football Federation (FA) last month, the Brazilian is being investigated for having “intentionally sought a yellow card from the referee” in at least four games. The alarm went off because, in one of those cases, 60 people in Rio de Janeiro had bet on a player’s warning and won a total of $100,000. According to British newspapers, the FA could ban him for life. A starter in the national team, Lucas Paquetá thanked the CBF for calling him, which appealed to his “presumption of innocence.”
In the midst of mistrust, a Brazilian legend, Ronaldinho – world champion in 2022 – surprised in the last few hours by stating that he would turn his back on his team in the Copa América. “I’m not going to watch any Brazil games. “There is a lack of drive, joy, playing well, football,” said the former Barcelona player, although it was soon learned that the statement was part of an advertising campaign in search of baits.
However, if for hours he generated a commotion in his country, to the point that the players responded from the United States, it was because there was something true: this Brazil still has no joy or plays well. That is precisely what the Dorival Júnior team is going to in the Copa América. To win again, without luxuries. Feijão football with rice.
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