BackWorld Cup 2014 | The myth of ‘jogo bonito’
Player exodus to European clubs has chipped away at the identity of Latin American football. Today, Brazil too play the game like any other top team in the world
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In Brazil, it is known as the Sarrià Stadium Tragedy. Zico called it “the day football died".
In 1982, Brazil needed a draw against Italy to make it through to the semi-finals. The result was considered a formality. Brazil were playing their best football since 1970; a fluid, constantly interchanging midfield made up of Zico, Sócrates and Paulo Roberto Falcão had mesmerized and bamboozled defences in the tournament. Scotland had been beaten 4-1, New Zealand 4-0 and Argentina 3-1, the last leading to a frustrated Diego Maradona getting himself sent off.
Italy, a slow, lumbering side, were given no chance, especially with a forward like Paolo Rossi, just emerging from a two-year ban and woefully short of match practice.
But when the game finally began, it was Rossi who scored in the fifth minute. At least one Brazilian squad member had feared such an outcome: “Waldir Peres, the latest in a long line of hapless Brazilian goalkeepers, admitted before the game that his great fear was that Rossi would suddenly spring into life," Jonathan Wilson wrote in a 2012 piece in the UK newspaper, The Guardian.“He proved a far better mystic than he was goalkeeper."
Sócrates restored parity for Brazil, but Rossi scored again in the 25th minute. Despite holding the lead deep into the second half, Italian resistance was considered to be over when Falcão drilled a fierce drive from outside the box in the 68th minute.
Brazil simply needed to see out the game to make it to the semi-finals. But playing for a draw was not in the Brazilian tradition, not for a team that epitomized the Brazilian way.
Brazil kept throwing themselves forward for the win, leaving space for Rossi to score his third goal and send the Selecao home.
Rossi’s hat-trick would plunge Brazilian football into an identity crisis.
When Brazil won their next two world cups in 1994 and 2002, the triumphs were achieved by efficient and organized sides, rather than the wilful, free-flowing trickery of 1982.
Brazilian football itself became similar to continental European football in terms of its organization and structure. Brazil still produced footballers such as Romário, Ronaldo and Ronaldinho, but they became the icing on the cake, rather than the cake itself. Occasionally, a player in the famous blue-and-yellow stripes may light up a game with an act of flamboyant brilliance. But jogo bonito, as a uniquely Brazilian way of interpreting and playing the game, was dead.
The year 1994 was the first time in world cup history that a final had yielded a goalless draw (and needed a penalty shoot-out to decide which way the trophy went). Brazil’s 2002 victory too was the result of a performance that was effective rather than spectacular.
But the clichés remain.
As Brazil prepare for a testing quarter-final against Colombia on Saturday, it feels important to reiterate this because of the lazy myths and assumptions that have been perpetuated through this World Cup. Somehow it has been assumed that Brazil would stride into the tournament, play their jogo bonito brand of football and simply inherit the trophy that has been theirs more than anyone else’s.
To believe so is to ignore the dual crisis that ails Brazilian football. The first one is philosophical. Despite the world cup victories of 1994 and 2002, the crisis of self-doubt sparked by 1982—the tension between football as an aesthetic or utilitarian pursuit—never went away. Brazil, rather all of Latin American football, is caught between two poles: the demands of adopting a more organized, European style or placing trust in their own unique, instinctive way of playing. The growing power of a few European mega clubs has diminished international football, but it has hurt Latin American nations the most. Given the huge disparity in pay, players leave for Europe before they can fully imbibe the methods and philosophies of their own lands.
Nearly three decades of player exodus has chipped away at the identity of Latin American football. The late Sócrates, a chain-smoking doctor who captained the 1982 team, lamented the state of affairs in his memoirs. “Even though it is often subconscious, we now try and copy European pragmatism. Our game has become more rational and tactically rigid," the Brazil great wrote. “With the best Brazilian players signing up for European clubs at an earlier age than ever before, they find it easier to pick up the habits of a society that is more mature and settled."
Ten of Brazil’s starting eleven in 1982 played for Brazilian clubs. The comparative figure in 2014 for the game against Chile: one (Fred, who plays for Rio de Janeiro’s Fluminense).
The second crisis for Brazil in 2014 is one of personnel. Simply put, this is the weakest Brazil side in decades. Frailties abound in nearly every area of the pitch: David Luiz is suspect in defence, midfielder Paulinho is having a rotten tournament and Fred and Jô, Brazil’s misfiring front men, would not be seen anywhere near a top European club (and indeed aren’t).
The Selecao lack depth: Barring Oscar and Neymar, Brazil—once overflowing with playmakers and forwards—have few channels of creativity. Mexico demonstrated it in the group stage, while the most dubious penalty of the tournament helped Brazil overcome Croatia in the opening game. Had Mauricio Pinilla’s final-minute strike on 28 June been 6 inches lower (thereby going into the net instead of hitting the crossbar), Chile, rather than Brazil, would be heading to the quarter-finals. It would have been entirely deserved.
More than halfway into the tournament, Brazil’s jogo bonito is yet to make an appearance. Maybe it is time to give that cliché a quiet burial. Jogo bonito doesn’t exist any more, because the conditions that produced it in the first place don’t exist.
Once we accept this, we can rephrase Zico’s assessment of 1982 as the moment jogo bonito—not football—died.
Vaibhav Vats is a writer based in New Delhi.
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