Filed under: Football
So - and there is a point to this - which World Cup was the best World Cup? Cast your vote now! Mexico 70, perhaps, dominated by the iconic Brazil of Pele, Jairzinho, Gerson, Tostao, Rivelino, Clodoaldo and Carlos Alberto? The 1950 tournament in Brazil, perhaps, Uruguay shocking the hosts in the fateful final, the most other-worldly match in World Cup history?How about 1974, an under-rated peach: the artistry of the Netherlands, scuppered at the last by a West German team who knew better how to close the deal? 1954 was a high-scoring classic: the artistry of the Hungarians, scuppered at the last by a West German team who knew better how to close the deal.
English fans could be forgiven for picking 1966 or 1990 for obvious reasons - not particularly great tournaments on the whole, if you look at it from the angle of an objective purist, but then objectivity isn't exactly what football's about. But if you want a bona fide classic, how about 1982, which had just about everything: villainy (West Germany's anschluss game with Austria, Harald Schumacher on Patrick Battiston, Diego Maradona losing his mind against Brazil), heroism (Algeria beating the Germans, Northern Ireland beating the hosts), slapstick comedy (Alan Hansen and Willie Miller running into each other against USSR), amazing comebacks (the Germans against the French) and sheer brilliance (Brazil, who handed the baton to a previously uninspired Italy in one of the all-time classic matches).
You've gotta love 1982.
Ah yes, the point. Point is, very few people will make a case for any of the World Cups of the last 20 years. The 1994 and 1998 editions were decent enough, though both petered out towards the end. As for anything since, forget it. The last three World Cups have been nothing short of abysmal. Entertaining enough while they lasted, but nobody's making any claims for them now, never mind rushing to the DVD store so they can watch Spain register a few 1-0 victories again.
Exactly how, why and when the World Cup went nipples up is a matter for hot debate - you can blame the modern stultifying tactics, the admittance of 32 teams to the final party, or the rise of the club game, with extra special reference to the Champions League - but what's clear is we're left with a competition that's lost its lustre.
The players know it, the coaches know it, and the spectators certainly know it, much as they try to keep their spirits up. One of the major reasons for the crackling lack of excitement is this: familiarity breeds... well, if not contempt, then at least withering apathy. World Cup results have been stupefying in their predictability in recent years, while the players are known to all. In this multimedia age of satellite communication and internet streams, the world is now a village. No longer do stars explode seemingly from nowhere in the sky - think of the buzz when Josimar burst onto the scene at the 1986 World Cup, for example - and that's because we've already seen them.
Brazil's current right-back? We've watched him in two Champions League finals already. Their midfield lynchpin plays for Liverpool, one of their strikers was a flop at Manchester City. Even the youthful promise of Neymar seems old news already, thanks to live Copa Libertadores action on British TV, friendlies against Scotland in London, the rumours of a transfer to Chelsea, and a million and one clips of him on YouTube.
Time to get the pipe and slippers out, then, because it really was better back in the day. That innocence is long gone, and nobody's putting the internet back in its box any time soon. But a little of that old-school tournament magic - the frisson and the shock of the new - can still be experienced at the Copa America, where teams that rarely (if ever) make it to the World Cup finals get their chance on a bigger stage. The big boys of Brazil and Argentina have - save 45 second-half minutes for the hosts against Costa Rica - so far been an egregious disgrace. But step forward Venezuela, a team still small enough to fly under the most of the world's media radar. Unlike the big boys of south American football, a sizable chunk of their squad are still home based, with only a few making a name for themselves in Europe. Their goalscoring hero in the win against Ecuador, the midfielder Cesar Gonzalez, plies his trade for struggling Argentinian outfit Gimnasia y Esgrima. Sparkling in the second half of that game was Jose Salomon Rondon, a 21-year-old beginning to make a name for himself in Spain with Malaga, but far from an established star. The victory - which followed a scarcely believable 0-0 draw against reigning champions Brazil - was only Venezuela's third in the entire history of the Copa America - a tournament they only entered for the first time in 1967, but still - and gives them a great chance of making the quarter finals.
This year's Copa has been patchy in terms of quality - only Chile, Uruguay and Argentina have managed to turn it on, and even then only in brief patches - but the flip side has been the resulting unpredictability. The odds still favour the big boys reaching the final - Argentina remain the favourites with their home advantage, while Brazil have only missed three finals since 1981 - but few would stake the mortgage on either to get the job done. We could be heading for a glorious denouement where anything could happen, the heroes coming from outside the pool of established world stars. It's not quite Espana 1982, of course, but it's more fascinating than anything the World Cup's thrown up for some time.
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Source: http://www.fanhouse.co.uk/2011/07/13/venezuela-copa-america-football/
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