It has been rather an underwhelming World Cup cycle for Brazil. They arrived at the Human Rights World Cup as fairly hot favourites but after their exit at the hands of Croatia in the last eight in Al-Rayyan four years ago things have drifted. They went out in the quarter-finals at the 2024 Copa América, then limped through Conmebol qualifying for the Geopolitics World Cup, finishing fifth after six defeats – to Uruguay, Colombia, Argentina (twice), Paraguay and Bolivia – with their lowest points tally since South America switched to an 18-game format for the 2002 tournament. In October they lost 3-2 to Japan in a friendly and in November they were held to a 1-1 draw by Tunisia.
Friendlies against France and Croatia await in the next international window, with Carlo Ancelotti’s squad announcement this week the penultimate selection before the big one in the summer. Despite their ragged results plenty of the class of 2022 remain. Marquinhos is still there, as are Alisson and Ederson, Casemiro, Danilo, Bremer, Vinícius Júnior and Alex Sandro. Brentford’s Igor Thiago has deservedly got a first call for the forthcoming games and there is space too for Bournemouth teenager Rayan.
But one big name is notable by its absence: Neymar. The 128-cap, 79-goal forward hasn’t played for his country since October 2023 when he suffered ACL-knack in a World Cup qualifier against Uruguay. He returned to play more than 2,000 minutes for Santos last season and, after another injury setback, was back in action for his club side in February. Ancelotti did not close the door when announcing his squad this week – “Neymar is not at 100% of his capability. If he can be at 100% physically, he can be there” – but time is not on his side.
All of which seemed to set things up very nicely for a series of self-defeating verbal haymakers from the player himself: “I’m going to speak out here, because I can’t just let this pass,” he began promisingly. But instead of writhing around on the floor in agony at the sheer injustice of it all, things then got rather mild mannered. “Obviously I’m upset and sad not to have been selected,” he sighed. “But the focus remains the same, day after day, training session after training session, match after match. We’ll achieve our goal. There’s still one final squad announcement to go and the dream lives on. That’s it, we’re in this together.” Which is disappointingly measured from a Football Daily perspective but maybe no bad thing for the man himself. Though whether his apparently newfound maturity pays off remains to be seen.
