Day
12. What happened today in Brazil.
Can somebody please explain where the real Brazil is? You know, the team made up of players that make you want to watch them over and over again, even repeats on TV of the same match, and that make you wish that the 90 minutes never end. Brazil beat Cameroon 4-1 today to move into the last 16. A comfortable scoreline, but a disjointed performance. I cringe when I read on Bbc live text comments about how great it is to see the "real" Brazil playing. Today may have been good for anybody who has seen Brazil play in the last 10 or 20 years. But it's ironic that in this World Cup of open attacking football, the team that should be putting on the finest display of attacking genius as they did regularly up until 1986, has been overtaken in that department by Algeria. And they were playing against a team that had nothing to play for, nothing to lose who even when they did have something to play for, barely bothered. When Brazil did put together a couple of quick, defenders-chasing-shadows passes the ball ended up at the feet of Hulk, and unlike most average players who would have been celebrating a goal he looked like his name and that was that. It had to be Neymar to lift the team, the 22 year old. And he did, with two goals. Just before the second, at 1-1, he went over to the touchline and had a few words with coach Big Phil. He spoke to Big Phil with his hand over his mouth, as is the norm with players and coaches at this World Cup (lest their conversations are picked up by the microphones and relayed back to the opposing coaches) and from the body language I imagined the conversation going something like this:
Neymar: "coach, I am the superstar, what am I am doing with these guys. And why are they called Fred and Hulk?"
Big Phil (and you have to picture his big shrug of the shoulders and roll of the eyes): "Neymar, what can I do? I have to let Fred play, he found God, he's important for the people and Hulk, pfff, he's Hulk, you know, he sounds kind of scary"
Neymar : "but, coach, every time I pass them the ball they fall over or forget if they are left or right footed...what do I do?"
Big Phil: " look, I cant stand it either. They're crap, but better than Jo, so go score a another goal all by yourself. The people will be happy. Then pass the ball to them a few times, maybe one of them will bounce of Fred's head into the net and nobody will notice he is offside. What can I do?"
Neymar: "ok, coach, watch this......"
Brazil had the champagne moment of the 4th goal, by which time the Cameroonians were wishing they hadn't made such a stink about their bonuses before they came to Brazil, and just wanted to go back to their club teams.
In other news.....Holland beat Chile 2-0. Both teams go through. Holland play Mexico, who finished second in Brazil's group, in the last 16 and Chile play Brazil.
That will be good, really good....Saturday at noon (Toronto time)
In still more news.....Spain played their meaningless match against Australia and took the opportunity to look to the future by playing David Villa and Fernando Torres. You know Villa is way past it because he recently moved to playing football in the US as he became New York City's first signing, although "moved" and "playing" are a little bit of a stretch as the team will not exist until early 2015. And Torres, well, as big of a fan as I have been, even I have to admit that a guy who has been a bit player in England for a couple of years is surely way past his glory days.
Tomorrow, is the big battle...Uruguay-Italy. One's in, one's out. Suarez or Balotelli? Who's going to the worst of the "why-always-me" boys?
Can somebody please explain where the real Brazil is? You know, the team made up of players that make you want to watch them over and over again, even repeats on TV of the same match, and that make you wish that the 90 minutes never end. Brazil beat Cameroon 4-1 today to move into the last 16. A comfortable scoreline, but a disjointed performance. I cringe when I read on Bbc live text comments about how great it is to see the "real" Brazil playing. Today may have been good for anybody who has seen Brazil play in the last 10 or 20 years. But it's ironic that in this World Cup of open attacking football, the team that should be putting on the finest display of attacking genius as they did regularly up until 1986, has been overtaken in that department by Algeria. And they were playing against a team that had nothing to play for, nothing to lose who even when they did have something to play for, barely bothered. When Brazil did put together a couple of quick, defenders-chasing-shadows passes the ball ended up at the feet of Hulk, and unlike most average players who would have been celebrating a goal he looked like his name and that was that. It had to be Neymar to lift the team, the 22 year old. And he did, with two goals. Just before the second, at 1-1, he went over to the touchline and had a few words with coach Big Phil. He spoke to Big Phil with his hand over his mouth, as is the norm with players and coaches at this World Cup (lest their conversations are picked up by the microphones and relayed back to the opposing coaches) and from the body language I imagined the conversation going something like this:
Neymar: "coach, I am the superstar, what am I am doing with these guys. And why are they called Fred and Hulk?"
Big Phil (and you have to picture his big shrug of the shoulders and roll of the eyes): "Neymar, what can I do? I have to let Fred play, he found God, he's important for the people and Hulk, pfff, he's Hulk, you know, he sounds kind of scary"
Neymar : "but, coach, every time I pass them the ball they fall over or forget if they are left or right footed...what do I do?"
Big Phil: " look, I cant stand it either. They're crap, but better than Jo, so go score a another goal all by yourself. The people will be happy. Then pass the ball to them a few times, maybe one of them will bounce of Fred's head into the net and nobody will notice he is offside. What can I do?"
Neymar: "ok, coach, watch this......"
Brazil had the champagne moment of the 4th goal, by which time the Cameroonians were wishing they hadn't made such a stink about their bonuses before they came to Brazil, and just wanted to go back to their club teams.
In other news.....Holland beat Chile 2-0. Both teams go through. Holland play Mexico, who finished second in Brazil's group, in the last 16 and Chile play Brazil.
That will be good, really good....Saturday at noon (Toronto time)
In still more news.....Spain played their meaningless match against Australia and took the opportunity to look to the future by playing David Villa and Fernando Torres. You know Villa is way past it because he recently moved to playing football in the US as he became New York City's first signing, although "moved" and "playing" are a little bit of a stretch as the team will not exist until early 2015. And Torres, well, as big of a fan as I have been, even I have to admit that a guy who has been a bit player in England for a couple of years is surely way past his glory days.
Tomorrow, is the big battle...Uruguay-Italy. One's in, one's out. Suarez or Balotelli? Who's going to the worst of the "why-always-me" boys?
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