Dunga's Brazil: unexplainable and intolerable

Brazil, five-time champions, have now exited the World Cup at the quarter-final stage twice in-a-row.

Brazil, the only team to have participated at every World Cup since the tournament's 1930 inception, are out. Again.


Dunga, the defender who led Brazil to glory in the USA's 1994 tournament, has overseen a defensively-orientated Samba outfit - based largely on his own all-conquering unit of the mid-90's - eliminated early.

Unsurprisingly, Dunga, like many other World Cup managers, was sacked. A disgruntled populace, that has come to expect trophies, hangs its head. As he heads for the exit door, the Brazilian, however, is alone.

Dunga has joined a growing list of World Cup managers that have, to my notice anyway, had their tenures ended post-tournament. Here are nine: France, South Africa, South Korea, Greece, Serbia, Australia, Japan, Italy, Ivory Coast. There will be more.

Unemployment, whether enforced, or already-arranged in several managers' cases, is the ultimate price for failure.

Other coaches though, England's Fabio Capello for instance, will receive extended time to improve his band of underachievers. Bob Bradley will get more time at Team US, Hitzfeld at Switzerland too.

Whether the sustainability works or not will be determined by future form, results and, perhaps, style.

Dunga, quite rightly to this observer anyway, has paid the price for failing to find results after deliberately sacrificing style.

Form, as the football cliche says, is temporary. Results, to twist the phrase, are permanent.
But Brazil's style is ingrained. And it is a flavour enjoyed by the world. To purposefully hinder it, one must be guarantee success. Dunga never even promised the World Cup for sacrificing a country's football heritage.

Supporters of eliminated World Cup teams always wake up the following day with one of the following feelings: shame, hope, embarrassment, pride, anger or joy.

For Brazilians, Dunga's warping of the style in which a nation has a kick-about will likely generate the first, the third and the fifth.