Brazil Preview Part Two: Midfield
January 22nd, 2009 | By: Julian | 5 Comments »
We covered Brazil’s defense last time, and this time we’ll look at their midfield. Some of you guys seemed to think that I was a little… enthusiastic about their defense, seeing as I used words like “stellar” and phrases like “best in the world.” I may have come off sounding like Ray Hudson talking about Barca, but I stand by what I said. I’m really hoping our defense will be able to stop Alves/Maicon, and more specifically, the crosses they put in. But we’ll worry about that when the game actually comes. We still have 2/3rds of their team to preview, so let’s get on with it.
If you guys forgot what their entire roster looks like (and If you did, that’s pretty pathetic. It’s been like 2 days), click here for a refresher.
Here’s the guys we’re interested in today:
5 MF Anderson
7 MF Kaká
8 MF Gilberto Silva
10 MF Ronaldinho
17 MF Josué
18 MF Alex
19 MF Mancini
20 MF Diego
On paper this looks pretty nasty. Ronaldinho and Kaka on the same team? Werder Bremen’s maestro Diego? Man U’s young star Anderson? It seems like they’ve got everyone and a bag of chips. How could we possibly stop them?
Firstly, let’s establish the positives about their midfield. Firstly and most importantly, since my grandma plays fullback on their defense, we don’t have to worry about her here (Is this running joke even funny? Please post replies in the comments). All kidding aside, they have some of the biggest current stars in soccer. Ronaldinho and Kaka are two of the biggest soccer players of the past decade, and Kaka on form is still one of the best players in the world. Furthermore, the Brazilians have all have reason to do well:
* Rat-Face will want to prove that he’s still got it.
* Anderson is an energetic youngster and will be eager to impress against a big team.
* Mancini is going through rough times at Inter, and will want to establish himself as deserving of a starting place.
Basically, everyone’s got their own motivations to shine on this one. I really don’t think we’ll see dour, boring football. Too much seems to be going on at an individual level, and I think everyone on Brazil will want to perform well and prove themselves. The plus-side here is that the midfield, at least, will play less as a friendly and more like a competitive game, which means the game won’t be nearly as boring as an episode of The Hills.
Luckily for us, big names don’t always equal a great team. Having superstars is nice, but a team can’t win things with great players on paper alone (see: England). The guys have to play as a team, and Brazil’s midfield have struggled with this in the past. Ronaldinho and Kaka can’t really play together- they’re the Brazilian version of Lampard and Gerrard. We’re starting to see this at Milan, too, with Kaka being played deeper than he’d like. And if they don’t gel, it benefits us all the more. If they’re not playing at 100%, it’s thier loss and our gain. Then again, that all depends on what formation Dunga uses and who he actually starts. But if he does start Ronaldinho and Kaka, based on past history I don’t expect them to set the world on fire.
Another potential problem for them is that we have one of the best ball-winners in the world in De Rossi (though I’m hoping he can regain the form he had last year, since he’s still not quite there) and they don’t really have a great defensive midfielder. Kaka, Anderson, Diego, Ronaldinho… all good players but all offensive players. Teams often need a breadwinner to break up the opponents’ play and regain possession for their team (Gattuso at WC06, for example), and the current Brazil squad may be light on that- though, admittedly, I don’t watch them play that often so I’m not sure. Silva is a DM and quite good but not at De Rossi’s level. Unless I’m missing someone, I think this is really where the key to the game lies. If De Rossi/Ambro/whoever else plays for us can disrupt their play and prevent them from going forward, we could keep the pressure off our backline and keep the ball in their half.
So, all in all, I’m more worried about thier defense than thier midfield. Sure, Kaka could have a moment of genius and Diego could provide a killer pass, but the midfield here usually plays less like Barca- Can you tell that I’m in love with Barca at the moment? This is what, the fifth time I’ve mentioned them in this post?- and more like… a team that isn’t on fire. They just really don’t click- one friendly against Portugal aside- and I feel like that’ll be a huge advatage of us. DDR should have a field day intercepting passes and bossing the midfield. That’s not to say that this will be an easy game- it won’t. If Brazil does click, it’s going to be a very tough game because they do have great players. But if we can start playing like a team, we have nothing to fear.
http://italy.worldcupblog.org/group-e/brazil-preview-part-two-midfield.html