Brazil Web Log
June 21-July 3
Day 8
I think by today the boys are beginning to realize what becoming a professional soccer player in Brazil is all about. Oscar’s take on “Ginga” is this. When they produced that film they left out the middle step in the development of players here. It’s not just about identification of street players and then they just go to Europe like Robinho and make millions. It is about getting up 6 days a week, having breakfast, training, having lunch, training again, having dinner, and then probably going to school at night. Even some of the pros go to night university because they want to become coaches. Oh yes, and you better get used to rice and beans. Some of the boys have ordered pizza at night, but we have to get special permission to do so. The nutritionist that runs the food service here does not allow the youth players to do that. With 4 meals a day it really isn’t necessary.
I mentioned that some of the pros are still in school. To be a coach at Atletico, Beto had to go to physical education college for 4 years. When he stopped playing pro four years ago at the age of 31, he became a youth coach here. He lives in Sao Paulo with his wife and daughter but has an apartment here in Curitiba. Every other weekend he goes home. It is a very good job to work for a club like Atletico and you can move up the ladder to even the pros in time. Each team from the u-15’s up to the pro team has a head coach, an assistant coach, and a goalkeeper coach so there are a number of positions and opportunities for advancement.
I received the printouts last night from the testing which I will give to each boy to take home. It has their raw score and then their percentile based on the standard for any Brazilian youth player in their age category. They are constantly collecting objective data, which of course, is not as important as the subjective evaluation of these players, but still gives them a lot of information about each person. You will be able to see how your son rates relative to other boys his age in Brazil. The regular youth players of athletic are generally way higher than the norms. They would expect any of their players to be between 70th and 100th percentile.
Tomorrow afternoon a local pro team called Iraty is coming here for another friendly match and Sunday morning before we leave the juvenils have an important match, so we can get to see those games here. It’s a shame that the boys didn’t get to see a game at the Arena, but with the 4 World Cup games this weekend there is still a lot of soccer for those that like to watch also.
This morning’s training for the field players consisted on a small sided game and then technical work with the small rubber balls that they like to use down here in skill training. It rained lightly but wasn’t windy or frigid, so the boys seemed to enjoy the work. The sessions are much less intense than a typical session in the US, but you can see how technique will improve over time with so much emphasis and time spent on it.
Miguel and I had a chance at lunchtime to check out a new facility that Atletico has used this year which is about 30 minutes away. This training center is just for the younger kids, ages 15 and down. It reminded me of a summer camp that I used to work at the summers I was on vacation from college. It is much more rustic that this center, but they are putting in a lot of nice facilities for training similar to what we have here. Right now they are importing younger kids to have Brazilian boys here all the time for training, starting from the age of 12. It was inspiring to see the boys standing in formation and singing the Brazilian anthem before lunch. What a great opportunity for some of these kids to have. I couldn’t help wonder what good it could do for some of our best 12 and 13 year old basketball kids from the inner city to have a situation like that at home. They have two women who function as dorm mothers for the boys, plus all the coaches and support staff that they have at this site.The boys go to school in the morning and then train in the afternoon.
In the afternoon the boys did more technical training, this time to goal with goalkeepers and regular soccer balls. I thought we were hitting the wall but the training was sharp and everyone was healthy and seemed to enjoy it.
Saturday’s game will not be all of us enhanced by a few Brazilians against a Brazilian team, but rather two teams completely mixed of our guys and Brazilians. I think the boys will enjoy that more, with no pressure for one team to win.
Day 9
The boys did some light technical and tactical training this morning, grabbed some lunch and watched the Argentina-Germany game in their rooms. In Brazil, everyone’s second favorite national team is whoever is playing Argentina, so most people here rooted for Germany. In addition, here is the south of Brazil, there are a lot of people of German descent. There were a few that hoped Argentina would advance since they were the only other South American team left, but most were pleased. Our game for tomorrow morning has been changed to the morning so we can train lightly in the afternoon and have plenty of time to get ready for Brazil-France at 4.
The pros had a friendly this afternoon and the visiting team can in to eat while we were in the dining hall. They are Iraty, a third division team from a nearby town. In actuality, Atletico put out a reserve side which included the second team forwards and goalkeepers, but also a number of new players that we did not know. The goalkeeper was Thiago, who played in the Arena last year when we were here, and one of the forwards was Herrera, a Colombian international who has just joined the club. As most reserve matches are, it was not as sharp as the first team match earlier in the week and much rougher.
The boys did some more technical and tactical work this afternoon with a larger group of Brazilian kids, a mixture of tryout kids and reserves from the juniors and juvenils. We have seen a wide array of sizes and talents throughout the week, which I think is very interesting for the boys. James, our goalkeeper, trained this afternoon with the 4 goalkeepers from the junior team, all of whom are huge. One of them, Joao, was the third goalkeeper for Brazil in the last u-17 World Championships. He should be the starting goalkeeper for the juvenils, but they have moved him up to challenge him, and he is the backup keeper for the juniors. The coaches here don’t seem to mind accommodating us and I find them to be much more flexible than many American coaches would be. The field players have had Nick and Mark, two American college players, with them for many sessions. They are the kind of kids I would hire as counselors at my camp at home. Gabriel and Fabio, two players who will be leaving the junior team but are outstanding players, have been at almost every session. The technical training is pretty much the same I have seen everyone here doing from the pros down.
We just watched Italy pound the Ukraine so I guess the stage is set for the first semifinal. Tomorrow will be a big day here in Brazil.
the end of the journey
