Dreams of glory died, and the colossus of South America fell hard. As tears rolled down the faces of players of the Brazilian team in Qatar, half a world away two-hundred million faces filled with tears of stunned dismay, despair, and sadness. It was a kick in the gut that Brazil was not ready for. The “beautiful game” had brought pain upon the nation that made it.
In airplanes, restaurants, block watch parties, and large gatherings to celebrate the expected victory, the silent cries and the palpable pain stood as a witness of the impact of its World Cup elimination on the spirit of the nation.
Brazil, football’s World Cup 2022 favourites, fell to Croatia, the World Cup runner-up in 2018, in the euphoria of a game that was all but won with a brilliant strike by Neymar that put Brazil ahead halfway through extra-time. It happened a scant few minutes before the game would end. It was a moment to celebrate. Not only was Brazil on its way to the semifinals, Neymar had just equalled Pele’s record of 77 international goals.
But, in a remarkable turnaround, Croatia’s Bruno Petkovic first evened the score at the 117th minute, forcing the game’s resolution into a shootout. Then, the Croatian team’s new hero Dominik Livakovic, the man who stopped three penalties against Japan in the previous game and had already made 10 saves in the game, stopped Rodrygo’s penalty shot while his team scored on all their shots.
Brazil fell to Livakovic.
There had been a lot of anticipation across Brazil of a glorious run to the final and that sixth title. A press conference by president-elect Lula was made sure to conclude so everyone had a chance to get to watch the game with family and friends. Lula himself promised that as he spoke.
It was a hard blow for the nation that had seen its football team as the unifying force that allowed it to escape a bruising political campaign that elected former president Lula over Bolsonaro by a slim margin that divided the nation nearly evenly.
Sao Paulo’s Vale de Anhangabaú, a pedestrian parkway of gardens and walkways in a valley between canyons of skyscrapers in the very centre of the noisiest part of downtown, is the perfect place for a celebration, and Brazilians gathered there, as they did in Rio de Janeiro’s iconic Copacabana Beach and in thousands of street parties across the continent-sized nation, to watch their beloved canary-yellow football team make its way to a sixth World Cup victory.
It was there that the shocking loss flowed through Brazilians like a river of ice water down alluvial valleys between tall mountains in a suffocating grief that resonated with that of their countrymen everywhere.
“Anhangabaú” is a Tupi-Guarani name for a river whose waters are believed to cause physical and spiritual pain. There was plenty of pain, say Brazilians who were there on Friday.
“We were already in euphoria, thinking ‘hexa’ [a reference to a record-enhancing sixth title for Brazil], and then, in half-an hour it was heartbreak,” Diego Moraes of the Brazilian state of Bahia, who watched the game with his wife, children, and friends at Anhangabaú told THE WEEK, about the minutes between the Neymar goal and the final result. “We all cried, our eyes just cried on their own. Everybody just wanted to go home quietly. It was sad.”
Brazil played better but lost the game.
At the FIFA Fan Fest on Copacabana, the beach went quiet. The collective knot in the throat of fans spread throughout the city and the country.
In Brasilia, semi-permanent signs that had proudly displayed since the beginning of the cup that this of that store would be closed during games of the Brazilian national team, were down soon after reopening on Friday.
Artfully decorated city blocks designed to celebrate victories into the night were quiet. Few had anything they wanted to say, save for a comment from a fan in the country’s capital area who said something about being a happy people who will now focus on the next cup. His words, however, were betrayed by how they faded behind the lump in his throat.
For a country that lives football, Friday was a bleak day.
The country had hoped to break a spell of losses since its 2002 title that has stopped them at the quarterfinals, falling to European teams: France in 2006, Netherlands in 2018, and Belgium in 2018.
As it happened again at the Education City Stadiun in Al Rayyan, Qatar this year and Neymar wept, those tears fell on nation in pure pain.
