Victory exposes Brazil's limitations

Once the euphoria of victory and hangovers pass, Brazil should feel the cold shiver of a World Cup disaster narrowly averted.

Saturday's 3-2 penalty shoot-out win over Chile exposed the Selecao's flaws, but also its lion heart. The question now is whether that strength will be enough to paper over those weaknesses.

The main storyline of the furiously-paced, high-stakes match that carried Brazil to the quarterfinals was of an aging goalkeeper on the backend of an impressive career rising to the occasion to prevent the World Cup host from tumbling into the abyss.

Had Julio Cesar not become hero of the hour, the consequences are almost too frightening to contemplate - national depression, certainly; perhaps riots, too, as the truth sunk in for Brazilians that they wouldn't win the World Cup they have paid billions of dollars to host.

Little wonder that one of the first to offer congratulations was President Dilma Rousseff. In this nation of 200 million people, there cannot have been many soccer fans more relieved than the Brazilian leader whose own political fortunes are in no small measure tied to the success or failure of the national team.

"Thank you, players" read a message on her Twitter feed.

Cesar's two penalty saves and two Chilean shots off the woodwork put the "What if Brazil loses?" question back on ice. But only for now.

So much about this victory suggested the World Cup will find out the answer to that question before the final and that the July 13 championship game most likely won't have the five-time world champion in it.

"Perhaps next time we won't be as lucky," said Brazil coach Luiz Felipe Scolari.

Cancel out Neymar - as Chile, exhaustion and the effects of a heavy first-half tackle did in the second half and 30 scoreless minutes of extra time - and Brazil loses its teeth.

That was obvious. So too was the fact Brazil is short a match-winning centerforward. Fred, ineffective again, certainly doesn't look the part, skying a first-half chance over the bar when he only had the Chile goalkeeper Claudio Bravo to beat.

More fundamental for Brazil is that Fred was slow to anticipate, keep pace with or link up with Neymar's electric-eel attacks. Jo came on for Fred when Scolari lost patience after 64 minutes, but he also doesn't look like the answer to the need for goals from more players than Neymar - who has four of Brazil's eight so far but didn't score on Saturday.

Defensively, Brazil is impressive. The pairing of Thiago Silva and David Luiz is now undefeated in 17 games that Scolari has started them together.

Silva, in particular, was ferocious in breaking down Chilean attacks, until Alexis Sanchez's goal evened the match at 1-1 in the 32nd minute, a score that stayed to the end. But Luiz claimed Brazil's opening goal after Silva headed the ball toward him from Neymar's corner.

The pressure was massive on Neymar, too, as he stepped up for what proved to be Brazil's last penalty shot.

"Neymar, Neymar, Neymar!" chanted the 57,700-strong crowd, a mantra repeated across South America's largest nation, before his stuttering run ended with the ball whizzing past Bravo.

Gonzalo Jara then saw his penalty bounce off the post for Chile, and Brazil erupted in celebration.

"People are demanding it from us, because we said we would win. Now we have to give it back to them," said Scolari. "If you make a promise, you must deliver. This is what the players are doing."

But this was close, too close for a nation looking to win its first World Cup at home.

Brazil's Julio Cesar dives at a shot taken by Chile's Gonzalo Jara during the penalty shootout of their match at the Mineirao stadium in Belo Horizonte on Saturday.Brazil won the shootout 3-2 to advance to the quarterfinals. Odd Andersen / Agence France-presse

(China Daily 06/30/2014 page24)