The new Brazil

January 2005 I bought my first FourFourTwo magazine in a newsstand in Orchard Road, Singapore - a yellow cover written "The New Brazil - Meet Kaka, Robinho, Adriano and six other reasons to get you excited"

Apart from the dubious homosexuality in the headline, the magazine displayed a magnificent 15-page report that told details of these players that I myself didn't know. Apart from those three, they also profiled Juan, Julio Baptista, Elano, Renato, Diego, Luis Fabiano. The first three have since become regulars in the national team, while the latter, from whom maybe more was expected, have wandered in a bit of obscurity and sub-utilization by their teams.

Between that month and now, more young promises arose - Daniel Carvalho, Fred, Nilmar being the most well-known. In spite of that, the status of "unbeatable" achieved by the first team made it difficult for these oyoung talents to come to sight within time of the World Cup. So we ended up with a kind of highbrow team that failed to deliver, maybe because eberyone there was in a comfort zone and did not feel the pressure to deliver their best.

Given all that, I got extremely pleased by the national team's performance this afternoon against Argentina. For a lot of reasons - Usage of young players, defined tactics, freedom given to Robinho's creativity, and some more which I will not write now.

Suffice it to say I always dreamed of watching Brazil play two lines of four, British style. Elano is perfect for right-midfield, and Robinho as an in-and-out second striker is brilliant. Fred is also sniffing the goal in a more lethal fashion than his lurky predecessors, Ronaldo and Adriano. I wonder if we played Gilberto and maybe Renato in central midfield, Kaka on the right, Robinho on the left, ROnaldinho as in-and-out striker, and Adriano slotting home, if anyone's to stop us.