Football World Cup 2006 Germany

Brazil

Brazil at the 2006 FIFA World Cup

Brazil

Nickname	Os Canarinhos (The Little Canaries), Verde-amarela, (Green and Yellow)
Association	Brazilian Football Confederation
Coach	Carlos Alberto Parreira, 2003-
Most caps	Cafu (141)
Top scorer	Pelé (77)
First international Argentina 3 - 0 Brazil (Buenos Aires, Argentina; August 20, 1914)
Largest win Brazil 10 - 1 Bolivia (São Paulo, Brazil; 10 April 1949)
Worst defeat Uruguay 6 - 0 Brazil (Viña del Mar, Chile; 18 September 1920)
World Cup
Appearances	18 (First in 1930)
Best result	Winners, 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002
Copa América
Appearances	31 (First in 1916)
Best result	Winners, 1919, 1922, 1949, 1989, 1997, 1999, 2004

The Brazilian national football team is the most successful national football team in the world, with five FIFA World Cup victories, including the most recent tournament in 2002. A common quip about football is: "The English invented it, the Brazilians perfected it."

Brazilians refer to the national football team as the "Seleção," which literally means "selection" and can be translated "the selected".

History

Brazil is the only nation to have qualified for every World Cup finals tournament and the first to win it five times (1958, 1962, 1970, 1994 and 2002). Considering the two second places (1950 and 1998) and the two third places (1938 and 1978), as well as many other honours, it is considered the most successful national football team in the world.

Early history

Brazil's first match, at home to Exeter City in 1914.

The national football team of Brazil was formed in 1914, and played their first game against the English club Exeter City in that year, winning 2–0. In spite of the future success, however, the nation's early appearances were far from brilliant, partly due to internal strife within Brazilian football over professionalism, which made the Brazilian Football Confederation unable to field full-strength teams. In particular, disputes between the São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro state football federations meant that the team would be composed of players coming from either of the federations. In both the 1930 and 1934 tournaments, Brazil were knocked out at the very first stage. But 1938 was a sign of things to come, as Brazil finished a strong third, with Leonidas da Silva making history and being the first player to score four goals in a World Cup match.

Brazil hosted the 1950 World Cup, which was the first tournament to be held after World War II. It was the only time Brazil hosted. The 1950 tournament was unique in not having a single final, but rather a final round-robin stage of four teams; however, to all intents and purposes the deciding game between Brazil and Uruguay acted as that tournament's "final". The match was hosted at the Maracanã stadium in Rio de Janeiro, watched by 200,000 people, and Brazil only needed a draw to win, but lost the match 2-1 after being 1-0 up; this match has since been known in South America as "Maracanazo".

For the 1954 World Cup, in Switzerland, the Brazilian team was almost completely renovated, so as to forget the Maracanã defeat, but still had a group of good players, including Nilton Santos, Djalma Santos, and Didi. Brazil didn't go very far though. The quarterfinals saw the favourites Hungarians beat Brazil 4-2 in one of the ugliest matches in football history, which would become infamous as the Battle of Berne.

World Cup 1958

Brazil's coach, Vicente Feola imposed strict rules on the squad for the 1958 World Cup, held in Sweden. The players were given a list of 40 things that they were not allowed to do, including wearing hats or umbrellas, smoking while wearing official clothing and talking to the press outside of allocated times. They were the only team to bring a psychologist (because the memories of 1950 still affected some players) or a dentist (for, because of their humble origins, many players had dental problems, which caused infections and also had negative impact on performance) with them, and had sent a representative to Europe to watch the qualifying matches a year before the tournament started.

Brazil were drawn in the toughest group, with England, the USSR and Austria. They beat Austria 3–0 in their first match, then drew 0–0 with England. The Brazilians had been worried about their match with the USSR who had exceptional fitness and were one of the favourites to win the tournament; their strategy was to take risks at the beginning of the match to try and score an early goal. Before the match, the leaders of the team, Bellini, Nilton Santos, and Didi, spoke to coach Feola and persuaded him to make three substitutions which were crucial for Brazil to defeat the Soviets and win the Cup: Zito, Garrincha, and Pelé would start playing against the USSR. From the kick off, they passed the ball to Garrincha who beat three players before hitting the post with a shot. They kept up the pressure relentlessly, and after three minutes which were later described as "the greatest three minutes in the history of football",^[1] Pelé gave Brazil the lead. They won the match 2–0. Pelé scored the only goal of their quarter-final match against Wales, and they beat France 5–2 in the semi-final. Brazil beat the hosts. Sweden, in the final 5-2, winning their first World Cup and becoming the first nation to win a World Cup title outside of its own continent. A celebrated fact was that Feola would sometimes take naps during training sessions and would sometimes close his eyes during matches, giving the impression that he was asleep! Because of this, Didi was sometimes said to be the real coach of the team, as he commanded the mid-field.

The Pelé era (1958–1970)

In the 1962 World Cup, Brazil got its second title with Garrincha as the star player, especially after Pelé was injured in the second game and unable to play for the rest of the World Cup.

In the 1966 World Cup, the preparation of the team was affected by political influences. All the major Brazilian clubs wanted their players included in the Brazilian team, to give them more exposure. In the final months of preparation, the coach Vicente Feola was working with 46 players, of which only 22 would go to England; this caused lots of internal dispute and psychological pressure. The result was that, in 1966, Brazil had their worst performance in all World Cups.

Brazil won its third World Cup in Mexico in the 1970 World Cup. Brazil fielded what has been considered to be the best football squad ever with Pelé, in his last World Cup finals, Carlos Alberto, Jairzinho, Tostão, Gérson and Rivelino. After winning the Jules Rimet Trophy for the third time Brazil was allowed to keep it for good.

1974–1990

After the international retirement of Pelé and other stars, Brazil was not able to overcome Holland's Total Football and could not defend their title in the 1974 World Cup, finishing in fourth place.

The 1978 World Cup was notoriously controversial. In the second group stage Brazil were competing with tournament hosts Argentina for top spot and a place in the World Cup final. In their last group match, Brazil defeated Poland 3-1 to go top of the group with a goal difference of +5. Argentina were only on a goal difference of +2, but in their last group match, they managed to defeat Peru 6-0 and thus qualify for the final. The controversy comes from the fact that not only was the Peruvian goalkeeper Ramón Quiroga born in Argentina, but had only let in 6 goals in the previous 5 matches, where as the Argentines had only scored 6 goals in the tournament up to that point. Both sides have always denied any wrongdoing. Because of this and the fact that Brazil were the only undefeated team of the whole cup, many Brazilians consider themselves the moral victors of this World Cup.

In the 1982 World Cup, the team played beautifully, with talents such as Zico, Falcão and Sócrates, under the coaching of Telê Santana, considered one of the best Brazilian coaches of all time. They won their group in the first round group, then beat Argentina 3–1 in their first second-round match. The tournament favourites Brazil could make do with a draw, but a 3–2 defeat to Italy, in one of the classic games in finals history, eliminated them from the tournament. Paolo Rossi scored all three of Italy's goals.

In the 1986 World Cup, Telê and several players of 1982 returned to play in the Cup of Mexico. The players were older, and could not repeat the same enchanting performance. Brazil was eliminated in penalties shoot outs against France.

In the 1990 World Cup, Brazil was coached by Sebastião Lazaroni, who was little known before the Cup and became even more anonymous afterwards. With a defensive scheme, whose main symbol was mid-field Dunga, the Brazilian Team lacked creativity, and was beaten by the Argentina of Diego Maradona.

More success (1994–present)

Brazil vs Haiti, Ronaldinho's second goal. Photo: Antônio Milena/ABr - Aug 19, 2004

Only in the 1994 World Cup, 24 years after winning the World Cup in Mexico, they were able to win another title. The struggles ended in World Cup USA with a final against 1970 opponents Italy. A dour and defensive final finished 0–0 after extra time, so Brazil and Italy competed in the first penalty shootout for a World Cup in the history of the tournament, and Brazil won when Roberto Baggio missed the final penalty.

Brazil finished as runner-up in the 1998 World Cup, losing to France in a problematic final game when the star player Ronaldo suffered health problems (or, it has been speculated, a nervous breakdown) a few hours before the game. The coach of the team at the time, was Mário Zagallo, who won the World Cups as player in 1958 and 1962, as the coach of 1970 and as assistant coach in 1994.

Fueled by the scintillating play of the "Three R's" (Ronaldo, Rivaldo, and Ronaldinho), Brazil won its fifth championship at the 2002 World Cup held in South Korea and Japan. The final was contested by the two most successful teams in the competition's history: Germany and Brazil. Ronaldo vanquished his France ' 98 demons scoring two goals in the Brazillian triumph. Surprisingly, they had never played each other in the World Cup before (there was, however, a match between Brazil and East Germany in the 1974 World Cup). Brazil won 2–0.

Brazil also won the Confederations Cup twice, in 1997 and 2005. Although they have never won a gold medal at the Olympic Games, they won two silver medals (1984 and 1988) and a bronze medal (1996).

The Brazilian youth team (formed by players under the age of 20) also won four titles of the World Youth Championship in 1983, 1985, 1993, and 2003.

World Cup record

Copa América record

Famous past players

Famous coaches

Cláudio Coutinho
Vicente Feola
Sebastião Lazaroni
Vanderlei Luxemburgo
Aymoré Moreira
Carlos Alberto Parreira
João Saldanha
Telê Santana
Luiz Felipe Scolari
Mário Zagallo
Ademir Pimenta

Current squad

Goalkeepers:

• Dida
• Júlio César
• Gomes
• Marcos

Defenders:

• Cafu
• Cicinho
• Cris
• Edmílson
• Gustavo Nery
• Juan
• Lúcio
• Roberto Carlos
• Roque Júnior

Midfielders:

• Júlio Baptista
• Emerson
• Gilberto Silva
• Juninho
• Kaká
• Ricardinho
• Ronaldinho
• Zé Roberto

Forwards:

• Adriano
• Robinho
• Ronaldo
• Fred
• Ricardo Oliveira

References

• Ruy Castro, Andrew Downie (translator) (2005). Garrincha - The triumph and tragedy of Brazil's forgotten footballing hero, Yellow Jersey Press, London. ISBN 0-224-06433-9.

Notes

1. ↑  Garrincha 122.

External links

• Brazilian World Cup Coca-Cola Cans
• The official brazilian football association website
• Archive of Brazil national team 1906- (in English and Portuguese)
• Archive of Brazil national team results 1914- (Only "A" Matches)
• Brazil in the World Cups
• Brazil: "As if they come from another planet..."

Home | Up | Argentina | Brazil | Ecuador | Paraguay

Football World Cup 2006, made by MultiMedia | Free content and software

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.