The boys from Brazil 🇧🇷

Neymar moving to PSG was great, as he got far less media coverage than he did at Barcelona.

His constant cheating infuriated me.

You only really have to hear about him in the Champions League now.
 
Aye. His play acting is ridiculous and I don't particularly like him.

But as a player he's up there with some of Brazil's best. He'd have won at least one Ballon d'Or if not for Messi and Ronaldo dominating the last decade.
To play devil's advocate though, that's like saying Beckham/Lampard/Gerrard would have won the ballon d'or if it wasn't for Rivaldo/Ronaldinho/Ronaldo etc (who all won it) though. The reason they didn't win it is they weren't quite good enough, and England weren't quite good enough.

Not that you need a ballon d'or winner to win the world cup necessarily, but I just don't feel like Neymar is going to deliver on his hype. Happy to be wrong though.
 
Neymar at club level is just earning a wage.

Neymar at international level… I’ve not seen many teams where a player is so good he takes the whole thing on his shoulders, gets the ball off the centre backs, goes on a dribble and tries to get in the box for the reverse.

Saw Neymar doing that for all of the 2014 World Cup, and changed my opinion of him as a player. He’s absolutely fantastic.
 
To play devil's advocate though, that's like saying Beckham/Lampard/Gerrard would have won the ballon d'or if it wasn't for Rivaldo/Ronaldinho/Ronaldo etc (who all won it) though. The reason they didn't win it is they weren't quite good enough, and England weren't quite good enough.

Not that you need a ballon d'or winner to win the world cup necessarily, but I just don't feel like Neymar is going to deliver on his hype. Happy to be wrong though.
Well true, but I think Beckham and co. probably had a chance because (Ronaldo aside, but he didn't have the fitness and therefore consistency) there were a clutch of players who were all very similar in level at that time.

Whereas peak Ronaldo and Messi were streets ahead of everyone else for years and most would argue in the entire history of football there's only 2 others who might have got a say.*

*Maradona and Mannion obviously.
 
Personally I enjoy seeing Brazil knocked out of the World Cup as I very quickly get sick of commentators fawning over their players as if they are some superior breed to the rest of the world. And it's never not fun to see Neymar crying.

Historically they have had some sublime players, but since 1970 the two times they won the World Cup they were generally more pragmatic and relied on the talents of Romario or Ronaldo to see them over the line.

Admittedly they are potential winners of Qatar22, but personally I don't see them having significantly betters chance than England, France and Spain, despite being far shorter odds with the bookies.
Would agree with this.

I also cannot remember a World Cup Brazil didn't have short odds for. If not favourites, they're always second favourites.

In the 12 world cups since Pele et al, they've won 2, which is the same as Italy/France/Argentina and 1 less than Germany.

You do have to wonder if they didn't have that wonderful spell from 1958-1970 would they be revered this way? It was a long time ago, but how relevant is it now?
 
They'll rightly be one of the favourites to win the tournament but I think their squad is a shadow of the great Brazil squads of 98 and 02. Could you really imagine a player of Fred's quality for example making those squads?

Their midfield options aren't that impressive and although they have some brilliant attacking options, they have several players who naturally play wide left, so it will be interesting to see what they go with for their frontline.

Are they likely to go with Richarlison on the right, Vin Jr wide left and Neymar playing as a second striker behind Jesus?
 
They'll rightly be one of the favourites to win the tournament but I think their squad is a shadow of the great Brazil squads of 98 and 02. Could you really imagine a player of Fred's quality for example making those squads?

Their midfield options aren't that impressive and although they have some brilliant attacking options, they have several players who naturally play wide left, so it will be interesting to see what they go with for their frontline.

Are they likely to go with Richarlison on the right, Vin Jr wide left and Neymar playing as a second striker behind Jesus?
No it will be 3 up top as I’ve explained.

Tite has all but based his methodology around this.
 
Would agree with this.

I also cannot remember a World Cup Brazil didn't have short odds for. If not favourites, they're always second favourites.

In the 12 world cups since Pele et al, they've won 2, which is the same as Italy/France/Argentina and 1 less than Germany.

You do have to wonder if they didn't have that wonderful spell from 1958-1970 would they be revered this way? It was a long time ago, but how relevant is it now?
You don’t mention that 1982 side that for many me included was arguably the best not to win the World Cup.
 
Few know Brazil better than Tim vickery ( he lives there) and this is his proposed starting 11

View attachment 48202
On paper it doesn't look like a Braziliain team to set the pulses racing but I appreciate they have a more pragmatic style nowadays.

Seems a shame though as Vin Jr is an exciting player to watch. I'd like to see him start.
 
On paper it doesn't look like a Braziliain team to set the pulses racing but I appreciate they have a more pragmatic style nowadays.

Seems a shame though as Vin Jr is an exciting player to watch. I'd like to see him start.
I think he still could as in the last few build games tete has swapped between vince jnr and raphinha.
 
You don’t mention that 1982 side that for many me included was arguably the best not to win the World Cup.
Well yeah cos they didn’t win it. For all they are lauded, they didn’t actually deliver (like Neymar and co didn’t in 2014). Didn’t even make the semis! I know they were a good side but playing good stuff and not winning is no use to Brazil now, 20 years after their last win. If they don’t win this WC it’s the same gap they had 1970 to 1994.
 
On paper it doesn't look like a Braziliain team to set the pulses racing but I appreciate they have a more pragmatic style nowadays.

Seems a shame though as Vin Jr is an exciting player to watch. I'd like to see him start.
Same with Argentina. Touted as one of the pre-tournament favourites but when you look at the side struggling to see why. They've had far stronger sides in the past.

Think one pundit was saying they missed Lo Celso in midfield. Well if you can't break down Saudi Arabia because you're missing a player deemed surplus to requirements by Spurs, you're hardly one of the favourites I'd suggest.
 
Same with Argentina. Touted as one of the pre-tournament favourites but when you look at the side struggling to see why. They've had far stronger sides in the past.

Think one pundit was saying they missed Lo Celso in midfield. Well if you can't break down Saudi Arabia because you're missing a player deemed surplus to requirements by Spurs, you're hardly one of the favourites I'd suggest.
Again, always short odds, despite being mostly crap since the 80s.
 
They'll rightly be one of the favourites to win the tournament but I think their squad is a shadow of the great Brazil squads of 98 and 02. Could you really imagine a player of Fred's quality for example making those squads?
When you look back at the 'golden eras' there are usually some surprisingly bad players in the squads, wasn't kleberson in brazils 2002 squad? He was probably about the same as Fred wasn't he?
 
They'll rightly be one of the favourites to win the tournament but I think their squad is a shadow of the great Brazil squads of 98 and 02. Could you really imagine a player of Fred's quality for example making those squads?
Is that the '98 squad which included Doriva?
And the '02 squad that included Richardinho?

 
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