Opinion – Sandro Macedo: What if Brazil had played in the Cup final?

This was the biggest Cup final since… Well, for this scribe, this was the biggest World Cup final of all time. Full stop. Or semicolon? Legend has it that the 1966 match was pretty “wonderful”, with England trailing behind, turning, suffering a draw in the 90th minute and scoring two goals in extra time, including a pre-VAR mandrake.

Going back to 2022, in addition to seeing the best and least popular player of the famous Qatar Saint-Germain trio being champion —and enduring the Argentines renewing the arsenal of stadium hits—, the Brazilians will stay for some time with the famous “What if…” question.

After all, if Brazil hadn’t had a hallucinogenic outbreak in those cursed final four minutes of extra time, they would have overcome Croatia with Neymar’s great goal.

Imagining the selection in the final also means conceiving that Tite and his men would pass through Argentina in the semifinals, to dispute the title with France. So let’s explore this metaverse.

Theories of netizens who are philosophers of the ball point out that Argentina, which beat Croatia 3-0, would massacre Brazil. Is not true. Each game is a game and the behavior of the brothers would be different if they had the Brazilians up front — as Croatia did not play the same way either.

But let’s think that Brazil would take revenge for the Copa América defeat to face France in the final.

Pre-match week news would all be pointing to the question, “Which president will represent the country in Qatar, the elected or the depressed?” In the end, neither of them would. The country would probably be represented by Eduardo Bolsonaro, who could wear his Arab sheikh outfit.

Before the decision against France, Tite would train different tactical schemes, with forwards Gabriel Martinelli and Antony playing as full-backs — we would no longer have full-backs, Alex Sandro would feel again against Argentina; and Daniel Alves would be an option on the bench if all the others called up could not play.

France reached the decision with many athletes apparently worn out, either because of the marathon of games or because of the flu that ran rampant in the delegation (it’s not Covid, if nobody tested it, nobody caught it).

Early on, after about 3 minutes of studying, Brazil would go up, with Martinelli forgetting that he was a winger and forming an attacking duo with Vinicius Junior. Mbappé would play behind him, with dangerous runs.

Before the 30 minutes, it would already be 2 to 2. Two from Mbappé on one side; one by Pombo and another by Neymar, from the penalty spot, suffered by Martinelli, from the other.

With everyone attacking, we would have many offside moves adjusted and the VAR would be one of the highlights of the final, triggered by several irregular goals.

In the final part of the second half, with the fear of taking a decisive goal, the teams would be more careful. Neymar, with his ankle hurting, wouldn’t mark anyone and would stay in the big midfield circle, trying to trigger Vini and little Rapha.

In overtime, Martinelli leaves and Daniel Alves enters. Galvão Bueno screams in a high pitched voice when he sees Dani at the edge of the lawn, ready to enter. “Can you do that, Caio?”.

France then use their secret weapon, hidden in the dugout, Benzema – if you can imagine, Benzema arrived in Qatar for the final. Galvão despairs again: “Can he play, Caio?”

Five minutes after entering, Benzema puts his hand on his thigh, feels an injury and asks to leave. There are no more changes, and he stays on the field, marking Dani Alves.

The game dramatically goes to penalties…

Now you can think about the result you find most convenient, but know that, in Brazil, Neymar is the fifth to beat.