Brazil vs Belgium: Superstars lined up for World Cup classic

It would not be a quarterfinal of the World Cup with some games of mind, of course. Brazil, according to Belgian coach Roberto Martinez, is "the best team in the competition", and urged his players simply to take advantage of the experience. "I do not think anyone expects us to go into the semifinals," he added.

The spirit of the loser is still a useful club to get out of your bag, and it may not be a coincidence Belgium has really started to get behind the wheel against Japan in Rostov only Monday night when they lost 2-0 and looked at the face humiliation. Their 3-2 victory in overtime was like a defining moment for a team so long ridiculed as the tournament's lightweights, who finally proved that they have the guts to gild their immense natural talent.

The truth is, however, that the Friday night game in Kazan is a match that one of the two teams really can not afford to lose. The Brazilians are favorites for the tournament and they will be favorites to impose here, but they will fail and by then, Qatar will do the trick in 2022, it will be more than 20 years since their last final of world Cup. The large crowds who gathered in front of the Mirage Hotel in Kazan to greet their team bus will expect nothing less than a sixth crown in Moscow later this month.

And yet, for their hopeless opponents, expectations weigh heavily. For all Martinez's strategic truckling, he knows as well as anyone that the biggest generation of Belgium is in danger of not reaching a single big tournament semifinal. Clearly, Martinez is, to a certain extent, carrying the difficult legacy of his predecessor, Marc Wilmots, and his four years of underestimated disappointment. But he can not say that he did not know the stakes. "A definition game for our generation," said captain Vincent Kompany about the game against Brazil. His teammate Thomas Meunier was in agreement. "It's now or never for Belgium," he said.

The great players of Belgium must therefore be very important. something that they did only sporadically during the tournament: the first half against Tunisia, the second half against Panama, the last 20 minutes against Japan and, for the most part, not the all against England. The rest that they got during their empty run should help them protect themselves from fatigue, but they will not have needed to watch the Brazilian victories against Serbia, Costa Rica and Mexico for know that it's a team capable of running them. The battle for possession will be key, and in this respect, the great Kevin de Bruyne will be essential to the midfield.

Martinez deployed De Bruyne much deeper than he normally plays for Manchester City, collecting the defense ball and trying to play it through the lines rather than choosing the last pass. He has also become a leader for Belgium, and Martinez remembers very well when they went 2-0 to Japan and where De Bruyne could be seen cajoling his colleagues, asking them to do more work. efforts and keep morale up.

And if Belgium can reach the last third, they can count on the most powerful attack of the tournament, with 12 goals up here. The two goals they scored against Japan and the last devastating counter-attack that brought their winner are proof of a team with a lot of ways to score. If Belgium needs a late goal, then she expects the imposing shadow and joysticks of Marouane Fellaini to get on the pitch, the Belgium Plan B hopes that it will not be too late. they will never need it but are extremely grateful. : Enter Brazil, the tournament's most nasty defensive, a more tight-knit team than any Brazilian team in recent memory, and now carry a momentum that bears the grim marks of their winning 2002 campaign. 19 clean sheets in 25 games, conceded a goal in four games, and more impressive just five shots on target. Fernandinho is a more than enough substitute for Casemiro suspended in midfield, and will be given the job of linking De Bruyne.

Later, the Brazilian press will try to overthrow Toby Alderweireld's defense, Jan Vertonghen and Kompany in the Belgian Premier League, by proposing fast transitions like those of Neymar and Philippe Coutinho in their sleep. As Willian says, "Our defense begins in attack." The Belgians, meanwhile, will not be excited by the response of Thomas Meunier, teammate of PSG Neymar, on how he planned to cancel the biggest threat of Brazil. "I do not know how to stop him," he said. "It is very unpredictable.In any case, I will do my best."

For the Brazilian coach Tite, the preparation of the match of Belgium will have started as soon as they took the plane to Samara after the victory against Mexico. Meticulous preparation, combined with pragmatic flexibility, has been Tite's trademark in Brazil. Alongside his 18-year-old assistant, Cleber Xavier, whose influence is such that he is responsible for answering tactical questions at press conferences, Tite has been able to give Brazil a distinctly subtle distinct gambling identity. the sunny and whimsical football of popular legend. Build at the back. Press the front. Mark zonally. Adjust your defensive block to the features of the opposition.

And most of all, get ready to tear everything up if things go against you. In their match against Mexico in the round of 16, Tite went from his 4-3-3 to 4-4-2 in the second half, which allowed Neymar to get closer to Coutinho, Gabriel Jesus sacrificing himself on the 39, left wing. Naturally, it was a change that had been drilled in advance, and eventually turned the game. In many ways, this was reminiscent of the Corinthians team with which Tite won two Brazilian championships , a Copa Libertadores and a Club World Cup earlier in the decade. An obsessive student of the game, Titus is married to his ideas, but not so married that he's not ready to abandon them when the need actually feels. Pragmatism, not ideology, is his mantra, and his motto "merecer vencer" ("gaining victory") is a recognition of the suffering needed to win the highest prizes. The mere fact of being Brazilian will not really cut it anymore.

Of course, the closer Brazil gets to the final, the more scars of the past will threaten to open. Selecao is not so much a football team as a traveling circus, a 24-hour telenovela, where nothing is ever whispered, only shouted. Neymar's criticism – which is only a yellow card of a suspension – can hardly fail to have entered the inner sanctum, and Titus was forced to defend his star player against accusations of diving, selfishness. Even his mother jumped to his defense on Thursday. "What matters is my son and what he will do in the future," said defiant Nadine Santos. "Not what people say, thank God, he feels good and continues to play well."

Yet, this is in many ways a new Brazilian team: not a single player of the 7-1 defeat against Germany four years ago was in the starting line-up against Mexico. They do not fear defeat, nor Belgium. "It was in Belgian culture that we felt defeated even before a match like this," admitted Kompany. "But all the players on our team who play in clubs around the world now believe that we can beat Brazil 100% There is not a single day when I go to bed thinking" if we lose " "

The World Cup is often described as a product of inferior quality to the game of elite clubs, games like this are his answer.The field will collapse with the names of the stars , the world superstars and Nacer Chadli, the quality should be on a par with the last stages of the Champions League.Tactical combat should be fascinating, the stakes could hardly be higher.If Brazil and the Belgium live their best life for 90 or 120 minutes, we could witness a real World Cup classic.

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