Brazil Web Log
June 21-July 3
Day 5
We got up and went straight into town after breakfast. Our first stop was at the traditional Sunday market in the middle of town.The fair takes up about 5 blocks and has everything from folk art to junk and food. The boys pretty much looked around for an hour and a half but didn't buy too much. I think most of the serious shopping will be at the Atletico store on Wednesday and then in the airport on the way home.
After the fair we took off for the mall, where every respectable American teen feels at home. This mall was very modern and similar to most of ours. We gave the guys a couple of hours there and managed to watch the England-Ecuador game in one of the restaurants. The boys headed for the food mall, McDonald's and Subway. We rounded everyone up in time to get back to the CT and the Portugal-Holland slugfest, The boys played sand soccer before and after dinner and then were able to lift weights and take a steam in the pro locker room.
Tomorrow we will get into a 6 day routine, training in the morning and afternoon each day. On Wednesday and Saturday we will have a match again in the afternoon. Wednesday morning we will also visit the stadium in the city. Tuesday and hopefully Saturday will be special as Brazil play. At noon here Tuesday there won't be anything else going on. They are really serious about that and Tuesday"s shedule will be adjusted accordingly.
Day 6
This morning the boys had a session involving a short field and a game with goalkeepers. They are starting to get into the routine. We started a little earlier since the Brazil game was at noon and lunch had to be moved up to 1130. When they came out of the session, the juniors reserves were playing on the next field. You could have a good run at a Division 1 college championship with those guys. They were playing a team from Mineas Gerais, which is quite a distance away. Take out the top 14 or 15 juniors and there is still a tremendous amount of talent here. The final score of that match was 4-1, and it was as much fun to watch as watching the pro team play.
Brazil won the World Cup match with Ghana 3-0, as you probably know, but their performance was suspect and the press are talking about how unimpressive their play was. Perreira has had a lot of success with the team in the past, but a lot of people don’t like how defensive he has them playing. At least Ronaldo got his goal and seems to be getting more into form. Some of the boys watched the game in the room with the big screen, which was crowded, and others preferred to hang in their rooms and watch. I prefer the atmosphere with the staff and players here in the big room and like to check their reactions. Saturday’s game with Italy should be extremely tense. That and Argentina-Germany should be the two best quarterfinals to watch.
In the afternoon, the session began with a couple of possession games and then finished with an hour of passing and crosses to goal. In this environment it is very common for these players to spend long periods doing the same technical practices. They have 8 to 10 sessions a week, compared to 2-5 for our teams at home. We assume that these players all just have great technique because of their early years of playing in the streets and parks, but even the pros spend a lot of time refining the simplest of techniques.
Tomorrow we will have the morning off and will visit the Kyocera Arena in the city. The game stadium is one of the most modern in South America and we will get a full tour, including the sports store there which has all the official product that the club sells. In the afternoon we will have our second friendly, probably against a team from the u-15’s.
Day 7
We visited the Kyocera Arena this morning, which like the training center is undergoing some improvements. It is a very modern and impressive facility for this part of the world. The “churrascaria” on the second floor is actually one of the best eating options in town and their supporters shop is also very large and modern compared to many I have visited. I think the store had one of its best days in a while other than a game day as every boy walked out with a bag of stuff. I think many of you will be receiving some of that Atletico memorabilia when the boys get back.
It is strange today to not have any games to watch, but the boys seem to be happy hanging in their rooms and around the pool table, ping pong table, foosball table and computers. This afternoon they played their second match, again mixed in with some Brazilian players. The opponent was a selection of players from the local Atletico academies. This club has associations with about 25 different satellite non-residential programs that run intramural leagues and then pick all-star teams to play the other academies. These boys were selected from those local groups and given the opportunity to come to the CT and play our group. For whatever reason, we did not play as well as we did in the first match. The final was 6-1 against as Olson scoring our only goal in the second half. The game was closer than the score, but the Brazilians play very quickly and take their chances pretty well. We had some chances that we should have done better with. There were one or two very good players on the other team and again it is impressive just how many players there are to pick from. None of these kids can get into the top 25-30 in their age group in the regular youth program. The academy kids are also from a bit higher social-economic rung as they pay 50 Reais a month (about 22 dollars) to be part of the program. Only a few of the regular youth players here are from the Academy setup, but it does ensure that everyone has a chance to be seen, and they wear the same jerseys that the regular youth players and pros do.
I know the boys think they should have done better individually and collectively and we will have one more chance to get a result. I’m not sure who we’ll be playing but it’s hard to find a bad team down here to play to build your confidence.
Day 8 and beyond
