International Football
Travelling fans turn Qatar as ‘home’ for Argentina
Lionel Messi and Argentina’s bid for a third World Cup crown is being boosted by hordes of travelling fans that have transformed each of their matches in Qatar into virtual home games.
Argentine football venues are renowned for their seething intensity – iconic Buenos Aires cauldrons such as the Bombonera or Monumental tremble with passionate ferocity.
Those kinds of scenes have been recreated regularly at Doha’s Lusail Stadium, where tens of thousands of Argentine fans have created a raucous wall of blue-and-white-shirted sound.
Argentina have already played three games at the glittering 88,966-seat arena, where Messi and his team-mates will battle Croatia on Tuesday, aiming to book a place in the World Cup final.
After most Argentina games, the “Albiceleste” have lingered on the pitch long after the final whistle, sharing a moment of emotionally charged communion with their supporters.
“We like to take advantage of these moments with the people who are here and in Argentina, where everyone is euphoric,” Messi said following Friday’s quarter-final win over the Netherlands.
According to the Argentine embassy in Qatar, between 35,000 and 40,000 fans have travelled to the World Cup to support the team, one of the largest contingents of overseas supporters at the tournament.
That sizeable support has been augmented by thousands of Qatar-based migrant workers from India and Bangladesh, where Messi and Argentina enjoy widespread support.
“Compared to France, Argentina aren’t quite at the same level as a team – but they are a team who are benefiting from the support they have here,” the Argentina-born former France striker David Trezeguet told AFP.
At the end of each of their victories at the World Cup, after joining supporters in post-match singing, Argentina’s players will repeat the line that they are playing for “45 million” of their compatriots.
“What I do, I do for the 45 million, They are going through a bad economic period. Giving people joy is the best thing that I can do at the moment,” said Argentina goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez, the hero of Friday’s penalty shootout win over the Netherlands.
Trezeguet believes the bond between Argentina’s players and their supporters has been forged by the economic crisis battering the country, where inflation has skyrocketed.
“My first memories of the Argentina team were in Mexico in 1986. It was crazy back then, but nothing like as crazy as it is now,” Trezeguet said. “The socio-economic situation in Argentina at the moment has made the support for the team more passionate than ever.”
According to reports in the media, many of the fans who have travelled to Qatar have spent years saving up to make the trip, diligently converting their Argentine pesos into US dollars in order to avoid the ravages of inflation.
Others such as Beto, a fan in his 60s interviewed by AFP as he walked through Doha’s Souq Waqif, have travelled to Qatar from the United States or elsewhere after emigrating overseas. The passion, however, remains as intense as ever.
“Even though I’ve lived in the United States for a long time, if you cut my wrist, I will bleed blue and white,” Beto told AFP.
“We have an immense passion for football. We suffer a lot on a daily basis because there are problems in our country, the economy is not doing well. But football gives us this energy which allows us to go from nothing to everything.”
That passion is evoked in two songs that have regularly reverberated around Qatar’s stadiums when Argentina are playing – “Vamos Argentina” and “Muchachos”, a de facto national anthem of the national team which name-checks Messi, Diego Maradona and the 1982 Falklands War between Argentina and Britain.
“Argentina is a complex, politically fractured country. There are few subjects that unite the country – but the Falklands and the football team do,” said Edgardo Esteban, director of the Falklands Museum in Buenos Aires.
AFP
International Football
Former Brazil coach Tite taking break to take care of mental, physical health
Former Brazil coach Tite said he is taking an indefinite career break in order to take care of his mental and physical health.
The 63-year-old, who led Brazil to the 2019 Copa America title, was hospitalised due to a heart issue last August. He was sacked by Flamengo the following month and had most recently been linked with the Corinthians job.
“I realised that there are times when you have to understand that, as a human being, I can be vulnerable and admitting that will certainly make me stronger,” Tite said in a statement posted on his son Matheus Bachi’s Instagram on Tuesday.
“I’m passionate about what I do and I’ll continue to be so, but after talking to my family and observing the signals my body was giving off, I decided that the best thing to do now is to take a break from my career to look after myself for as long as it takes.
“As has become public, there was a conversation in progress with Corinthians, but it will have to be paralysed by a difficult but necessary decision.”
Tite, who stepped down as Brazil coach after their quarter-final exit from the 2022 World Cup, has previously coached a string of Brazilian sides including Gremio, Atletico Mineiro and Palmeiras.
-Reuters
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Brazil have sacked head coach Dorival Jr, the country’s football confederation (CBF) said on Friday after the five-time world champions were thrashed 4-1 away to fierce rivals Argentina in a humiliating qualifying loss in Buenos Aires.
The 62-year-old was appointed in January 2024 after the team spent a year under two caretaker coaches as the Brazilian FA were unable to lure Italian Carlo Ancelotti from Real Madrid.
“The Brazilian Football Confederation informs that coach Dorival Jr is no longer in charge of the Brazilian national team,” the confederation said in a statement.
“The management thanks (Dorival) and wishes him success in continuing his career … the CBF will work to find his replacement,” it added.
Dorival was handed the job after his success with Flamengo in 2022 where he won the Copa Libertadores and Brazilian Cup, a trophy he lifted again the next year with Sao Paulo.
However, he never seemed to get to grips with the national team job and failed to earn the trust of Brazil’s demanding fans after winning only seven of his 16 games in charge.
Sources told Reuters the CBF was not confident in Dorival’s work, considering there had been little to no progress since a lacklustre Copa America campaign when Brazil were knocked out in the quarter-finals by Uruguay last year.
Still, the CBF was willing to wait and see until the 2026 World Cup qualifiers against Ecuador and Paraguay in June to reassess the situation following the end of the European season and the Club World Cup in the U.S. in June and July.
But after Brazil slumped to their heaviest-ever loss in a qualifier when they were thrashed by Argentina this week, CBF president Ednaldo Rodrigues decided to pull the trigger.
IDEAL CANDIDATE
Sources told Reuters Ancelotti was still the ideal candidate but he is under contract with Real until July 2026 and there is no indication he would leave the European and Spanish champions.
Brazilian media have reported that Al Hilal’s Portuguese coach Jorge Jesus is the favourite to replace Dorival.
Brazil have been in unfamiliar territory for over two years since crashing out of the 2022 World Cup against Croatia on penalties in the quarter-finals, a heartbreaking elimination that led to the exit of long-time manager Tite.
Their humbling defeat in Buenos Aires was the latest of a series of negative records Brazil have set under caretakers Ramon Menezes and Fernando Diniz and with Dorival in charge. They had never conceded four goals in a World Cup qualifier.
Brazil are in the midst of their worst-ever World Cup qualifying campaign. They are fourth in the South American standings with 21 points, a point above sixth-placed Colombia who currently occupy the final direct qualifying berth.
Never have Brazil lost so many games, conceded so many goals or set so many negative records in the qualifying competition. They have lost five of their 14 games and conceded 16 goals.
Brazil’s 1-0 defeat by Argentina in the Maracana late in 2023 was their first-ever qualifying loss on home soil.
They also lost to Colombia for the first time, saw the end of their unbeaten run against Uruguay stretching back over two decades and were defeated by Morocco and Senegal, having never previously lost to an African nation.
-Reuters
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International Football
England’s German manager Tuchel will not sing the English anthem in his first game
England manager Thomas Tuchel said he would have to “earn the right” to sing the national anthem, God Save the King, after announcing his 26-man squad on Friday ahead of the team’s World Cup qualifiers.
Tuchel, who was appointed as Gareth Southgate’s successor in October and named his first squad to face Albania and Latvia this month, said he would not sing the anthem in his first games in charge.
“It means a lot to me, I can assure you, but I can feel that because it is so meaningful and it is so emotional and it is so powerful, the national anthem, that I have to earn my right to sing it,” the 51-year-old German told a news conference.
Former caretaker manager Lee Carsley was criticised last year for not singing the anthem during his tenure.
However, Tuchel added that while he is proud to be in charge of the team and knows the words to the anthem, he plans to earn the right with results.
“Maybe I have to dive more into the culture and earn my right from you, from the players, from the supporters, so everyone feels like ‘he should sing it now, he’s one of our own, he’s the English manager, he should sing it’,” he said.
-Reuters
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