Staring at the unthinkable: Brazil’s plight in World Cup qualification points to the rot that entered its footballing soul long ago | Football News
Brazil’s latest coach Dorival Junior has waged several battles for survival. As a journeyman defensive midfielder, he turned up for 13 different clubs in 16 years; his 25 years as manager has been scattered across 23 clubs. In between, he outlasted cancer. Yet, his biggest fight for survival could yet to be, as the coach of the most successful football country in the world, a journey intertwined with Brazil’s fate in qualifying for the 2026 World Cup. The burden on his broad shoulders is inhuman, a crushing weight no other coach in his country has shouldered. It is not to lift the World Cup, a load most coaches in Brazil’s history had to drag, but to qualify for the World Cup. A bloated tournament — a leap from 32 to 48 — could allay some anxiety. Brazil can’t be that bad. ain’t they? But the eventuality of the world’s most decorated football country, the breathing soul of the game for the romantics, missing out on the tournament is not just a lurid fever dream, but …