20 June 2014

The Bull Dies

Watching Spain in this World Cup was like going to a bullfight without knowing that the bull always dies. Early 21st century Spanish football revolutionized the game in the most functional sense of the word, moving the game forward into an unexplored dimension. Before opposing tactical systems were designed to cope with and in that dimension, the elegant, lethal force of the bull was irresistible. But once Spain had won everything several times over, their competitive edge was blunted even further by age and the counter-revolution (conjured, perhaps, by the dark arts of Mourinho). This is not to say football has regressed, but the Spanish revolution in football is now in the dustbin of history. This was as inevitable as it was retroactively predictable.

As many other more qualified commentators have noted, the continual evolution of football tactics is accompanied by an across the globe leap in technical quality (just look at all the freestylers out there) and a quantitative surge in player fitness. The spatial science of player positioning and movement must combine with the potential for long term energy output, resilience to physiological damage and intense psychological conditioning. It seems nearly impossible for a side to manage this combination for seven games, yet one team will have to do just that.  

This raises the inevitable question of what is going to happen in the Holland  x Chile match that will decide who goes through to meet Brazil in the round of 16. With both on six points a draw will put Holland top on goal differential. If Chile can put together another performance like today´s they might very well win but could have nothing in the tank for Croatia or Mexico. If they rest and play for a draw, or not be too upset by losing, there is Brazil to play. I don´t know if this is Occam´s Razor, a Nicomachean conundrum, or a Nerudian sonnet.

This is the first World Cup in Latin America since 1986. That is a long time ago. International travel has expanded dramatically and the middle classes have grown. There were at least 70,000 Argentines in Rio for their match against Bosnia. Dozens of them jumped over the walls of the Maracanã. Some of the 40,000 Chileans did the same thing tonight. South of the Rio Bravo del Norte, we are used to this kind of thing and the police reaction it brings. When I see the excessive amount of military police lining the approaches to the Maracanã, it doesn´t seem that out of place because that is how every game is. It´s absurd but normal.

What isn´t normal is the kind of atmosphere that has been produced inside and outside the stadiums.

In the Maracanã, Minerão, Castelão, Verdão, etc, of old there was no clock just a crappy scoreboard with broken lightbulbs. Everyone knew to look at their watches or listen to the radio or ask someone with either one. Many of the best known, most loved stadiums in Latin America are minimalist structures designed to hold tens of thousands of people for two hours as they jump up and down, light fireworks and tumble over each other. Sure, they may not be the most comfortable places but they are actual places. Stands are for standing, if they weren´t they would be called something else. The new stadiums are more comfortable, but they are non-places.

After the Spain Chile match, I walked over and sat in the same place that I sat when the last game was played at the old Maracanã. In 2010, the lights went off within 30 minutes after the game and the cleaning crew came in. There was a profound, rattling silence. There was no television screen and no security guards came by to move me along.

After the game tonight I was assaulted by piercingly loud advertisements. The televisions screamed “BUY THIS SHIT NOW!” while Chileans tried to celebrate their historic moment. The sound was so deafening that it made me want to leave as soon as possible. I resisted. Twenty minutes later, most of the fans had left and the advertisements stopped. In their place some decent Brazilian music wafted about as the stewards kept angry eyes on the partying Chileans and the all-black cleaning crews readied their brooms.

On the way out, the Chileans were in good voice and I sat to give an interview on a metal bench at the Coca-Cola stand. Describing the scene around me was pretty sad as I saw no beer vendors, nowhere for people to congregate and thousands of police. Looking past an Itaú bank stand where I could have gotten instant credit, my eye was caught by a fancy new Hyundai, the official FIFA fan shop and a Johnson and Johnson stand which advertised a “Caring Stadium”.

All of this global corporatism was placed directly in front of the Museu do Indio, Brazil´s oldest indigenous museum. The indigenous community that occupied the building between 2006 and 2013 was violently removed to prepare the city for the World Cup. The justification was that the building would have to be destroyed so that fans could more easily exit the stadium. Now, fans have to walk through an obstacle course where Fuleco and Brazuca block the path to the metro. Expelled from the stadium, we are ushered into a sanitized zone of corporate feudalism where the violence of dispossession is hidden behind the shields of riot police and dulled by the happy buzz of a spectacle well-consumed.  This is what is out of place at the Brazilian World Cup.



No comments:

free counters

Labels

2014 World Cup Rio de Janeiro Maracanã FIFA 2016 Olympics 2016 Summer Olympics Eduardo Paes CBF Copa do Mundo 2014 Rio de Janeiro Olympics Ricardo Texeira World Cup 2014 Vasco da Gama 2010 World Cup White Elephants mega-events APO UPP BRT Brazil football Flamengo Lula Orlando Silva violence ANT Aldeia Maracana Carlos Nuzman Dilma Eike Batista Rio 2016 Sergio Cabral 2007 Pan American Games Campeonato Carioca Corruption IOC Jerome Valcke Novo Maracanã stadiums BOPE BRASIL 2016 Brasil 2014 Engenhao Joao Havelange Maracana Policia Militar Vila Autódromo Aldo Rebelo Botafogo Henrique Meirelles Medida Provisoria Metro Revolta do Vinagre Sao Paulo Sepp Blatter World Cup 2010 forced removal Carnaval Elefantes Brancos Fechadao Marcia Lins Minerao Morumbi Odebrecht Porto Maravilha Rio+20 Romario Security Walls South Africa South Africa 2010 TCU Transoeste protests public money public transportation slavery transparency x-Maracana Andrew Jennings Argentina Audiencia Publica Barcelona Brazil Carvalho Hosken Comitê Popular Confederatons Cup Copa do Brasil 2010 Cost overruns Crisis of Capital Accumulation EMOP FERJ Favela do Metro Fluminense Fluminese Fonte Novo IMX Jose Marin Leonel Messi London 2012 Marcelo Freixo Maré Museu do Indio Olympic Delivery Authority Perimetral Rocinha Soccerex Transcarioca bicycles consumer society debt idiocy militarization transportation 1995 Rugby World Cup 2004 Olympics 2015 Copa America Banco Imobiliario Barcas SA Belo Horizonte Bom Senso F.C. Brasilerao CDURP CONMEBOL Champions League. Mourinho Complexo do Alemão Copa Libertadores Cupula dos Povos ESPN England FiFA Fan Fest Istanbul 2020 Jogos Militares John Carioca Kaka Manaus McDonald's Obama Olympic Village PPP Paralympics Providencia Recife Russia Salvador Soccer City Taksim Square Tatu-bola Urban Social Forum Vidigal Vila Olimpica War World Cup Xaracana attendance figures cities corrupcao drugs estadios football frangueiro futebol mafia planejamento urbano police repression porn privitization reforms shock doctrine taxes 201 2010 Elections 2010 Vancouver Olypmics 2013 2018 World Cup 2030 Argentina / Uruguay ABRAJI AGENCO ANPUR ANT-SP Amazonia Ancelmo Gois Andrade Gutierrez Anthony Garotinho Arena Amazonia Arena Pernambucana Athens Atlético Paranaense Avenida das Americas BID Barra de Tijuca Blatter Brasil x Cote d'Iviore Brasileirão 2013 Brasilia Brasilierao Bruno Souza Bus fares COB COI COMLURB CPI CPO Cabral Caixa Economica Canal do Anil Cantagalo Celio de Barros Cesar Maia Chapeu Mangueira Chile 2015 Choque do Ordem Cidade da Copa Class One Powerboat Racing Clint Dempsey Comite Companhia das Docas Copa do Brasil Corinthians Cuiabá Curitiba Dave Zrin David Harvey Der Spiegel Eastwood Edge of Sports Escola Friendenrich Expo Estadio Expo Urbano FGV Fonte Nova Gamboa Garotinho Geostadia Ghana Globo Greek Debt Crisis Greek Olympics HBO Hipoptopoma IMG IPHAN ISL Iniesta Internatinal Football Arena Invictus Istanbul Itaquerao Jacque Rogge Jefferson John Coates Jose Beltrame Julio Grondona Julio Lopes Julio de Lamare Knights Templar Korea Lei Geral da Copa MAR MEX Manchester United Mangabeira Unger Maracanã. Soccerex Marina da Gloria Mexico Milton Santos Molotov Cocktail Mr.Balls Neymar Nicholas Leoz Nilton Santos Olympic Flag Olympic Park Project Oscar Niemeyer Pacaembu Pan American Games Parque Olimpico Pernambuco Plano Popular Plano Popular do Maracana Plano Popular do Maracanã Play the Game Pope Porto Alegre Porto Olimpico Porto Seguro Portuguesa Praca Tiradentes Preview Projeto Morrinho Putin Qatar Quatar 2022 RSA Realengo Regis Fichtner Roberto Dinamite Russia 2018 SETRANS SMH Santa Teresa Santos Sao Raimundo Sargento Pepper Security Cameras Smart City Sochi 2014 South Korea Stormtroopers São Januário São Paulo Teargas Templars Tokyo 2020 Tropa do Elite II Turkey UFRJ/IPPUR URU USA USA! Unidos da Tijuca United States government Urban Age Conference VVIP Via Binário Victory Team Vila Autodromo Vila Cruzeiro Vila do Pan Vilvadao Vivaldao Volta Alice Wasteland Workers' Party World Cup 2018 Xavi Zurich apartments atrazos barrier beer bio-fuels bonde capacities civil society comite popular copa sudamericana crack crime dengue dictatorship estádios favelalógica feira livre fiador flooding freedom of information furos geral graffiti guarda municipal host city agreement identity infrastructure ipanema istoe labor rape riots schedule school shooting security segregation social movements stadium state of exception supervia tear gas ticket prices torcidas organizadas tourism traffic tragedy trash trem-bala velodromo wikileaks xingar