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Sao Paulo (AFP) – It is rare in the closed club of world football champions to see a foreign coach at the head of a selection. But in the absence of a unanimous Brazilian technician and following more than two decades without a title, Brazil seems ready to take the plunge.
The search for the providential man is in the hands of the president of the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF), Ednaldo Rodrigues, who opened the door to the appointment of a non-Brazilian coach at the head of the Seleçao.
“We have no prejudices regarding nationality”, he said on January 17, announcing that the CBF was prospecting on the market to find a replacement for Tite, whose departure had been recorded even before the disappointment of another defeat in the quarter-finals at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, four years following the same disappointment in Russia.
“We want a respected coach who is able to appreciate a level of play in accordance with our players. We want to do what Brazil have always tried to do: be very attacking,” he explained.
Each of Brazil’s five titles has been won with a local coach on the bench (1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002), but the shortage of more than twenty years and the elimination five times in a row by a European nation changes the given. Especially since today on the benches in Brazil, no coach stands out.
“There is quality but we used to train more coaches than today. The new generation is not yet installed, it does not win enough titles to be unchallenged”, commented Luiz Felipe Scolari, the last coach to have won a World Cup, in 2002, with Brazil.
Panel
Even before Tite’s departure, the local and international press was swarming with potential candidates, but not always free: the Spaniards Pep Guardiola and Luis Enrique, the Italian Carlo Ancelotti, the Frenchman Zinedine Zidane, the Portuguese José Mourinho or the Argentinians Marcelo Gallardo and Mauricio Pochettino.
Portuguese coaches who work in Brazil were also mentioned: Abel Ferreira (Palmeiras) and Jorge Jesus (Flamengo idol).
“Until the end of last year, I think I saw at least 26 different names go by,” joked Ednaldo Rodrigues, who hopes to announce the new chef auriverde no later than March.
Recruiting a world-class coach when almost everyone has long-term commitments, and getting Brazil to accept that a “gringo” coaches the Seleçao is a challenge: 48% of Brazilians are once morest it, according to a poll carried out in December by the Datafolha institute, which nevertheless shows that the rejection of the scenario of a foreign coach is decreasing.
“In Brazil, an idea is circulating: we have the best football in the world, so we don’t need a foreign coach to tell us how to play,” Victor Figols, historian and publisher of the sports portal Ludopédio, told AFP. .
Train the next
In the more than century-old history of the Seleçao, only three foreigners have been in charge, all ephemerally: the Uruguayan Ramon Platero (1925), the Portuguese Jorge Gomes de Lima (1944) and the Argentinian Filpo Nuñez (1965 ).
Et les Scolari, Vanderlei Luxemburgo, Carlos Alberto Parreira, Ricardo Gomes ou Zico ont acquis leur titre de noblesse sur des bancs hors du pays.
“An image has been built over the course of history that because we train great players, we also train great coaches, but that is not true,” said Victor Figols.
The Brazilian press has also put forward the names of locals Dorival Junior (winner of the Copa Libertadores in 2022 with Flamengo), Fernando Diniz (Fluminense), Renato Portaluppi (Gremio) and Mano Menezes (Internacional), as potential candidates.
But none of them had Tite’s track record when he took office, he who had won everything that a Brazilian club might win, including the Club World Cup (2012), the last won by a South American team.
“It is necessary to improve the level of those who work here, whether we hire a foreigner or a Brazilian,” writes Vinicius Coelho for the daily Folha de Sao Paulo.
“Guardiola will not come, adds the author of the book ‘The Brazilian School of Football’. We will form our own Pep Guardiola in a few years, as we formed Zagallo and Telê Santana in their time”.
© 2023 AFP
