he reports
Antonio Barilla
SENT TO DOHA
On the lawn of the Grand Hamad Complex, disenchantment doesn’t scratch concentration. It is the new soul of Tite’s Brazil, cheeky DNA and European solidity, the dough created to chase a Cup that the country has been waiting for too long. Twenty years, the smile of Yokohama, then only illusions and shattered promises.
When Brazil won the last World Cup, Neymar was the kid who tattooed on his calf: a ball under his arm, a Seleçao cap and bare shoulders, his gaze crossing a shanty town and settling on a soccer field. He charmed with street football and dreamed of becoming Rivaldo or Evair. Or Marcos, who played in goal but was the flag of Palmeiras, the team of his heart.
He went further, he is only two goals behind Pelé, who can already break the green-gold record of all-time goalscorer in Qatar. He doesn’t dare to approach, even though O Rey himself has repeatedly admitted to looking at himself in his mirror, and the World Cup in which he makes his debut today against Serbia marks a ferocious difference: the legend of Santos, also the cradle of Neymar, has won three editions, he only witnessed European triumphs, betrayed by fate – in the home final at Mineirazo, in 2014, he was not there due to a serious injury and who knows if Germany would have won anyway – or by his incompleteness, by his masochistic oscillation between strokes of genius and whims: in 2018, in Russia, he was supposed to be the protagonist, he became one for the simulations and found himself a symbol of a burning elimination, in the quarterfinals with Belgium.
Today he is another Neymar, he is thirty years old and has a new maturity, he is ready to take over the national team and lead it towards the dream. With the added motivation of age, which could give him the last chance: a recent confidence made him think about a choice, in reality he specified that he had been misunderstood, that he only wanted to play in Doha as if he had no other chances. because the future you never know what it holds and of postponed hopes it is already an expert. Tite, already on the bench in Russia – he replaced Dunga in 2016 – has rebuilt without upsetting, carrying forward the process of “Europeanization” of a spectacular but often smoky football, focusing on a defense forged in Italy: Danilo, Alex Sandro and the new Bremer I’m present, but all of the squad, except Militao, have moved on from Serie A. “Balance is important,” says the coach, who is tempted to cover himself more by introducing Fred, before confiding his state of mind: «I am lighter, more at peace than four years ago, but I feel the pressure of the country that has the culture of football. Dreaming is beautiful, we will do our best ».
Neymar, in this more attentive Brazil, is the other half of the sky, the image man of a school that has always entertained, made up of fantasies and acrobatics, heel strikes and juggling dribbles. Those who already when he was playing in the street in Mogi das Cruzes people stopped to admire and that prompted Santos to snatch him, just eleven, from Portoguesa Santista. The World Cup was a dream, just like today: the difference is that today it depends on him – even on him, above all on him – and that he doesn’t caress him, like in a tattoo, looking beyond a slum: he cradles him, on a special eve, looking over the Doha skyline. —
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