Finally (?)
Well, that was unexpected. Most of you should be aware of it, but a few hours ago in this sunny Friday afternoon here in Brazil, most specifically in São Paulo’s State Federation of Football, CBF announced that Mano Menezes was fired from his position as Brazil’s national team coach.
He was already hanging on his job ever since the loss to Mexico in the Olympics back in August. Brazil had a few good games, struggled a bit coming into the last rounds and fell to Mexico, who’s historically a tough opponent against the Seleção. After that, he had a nice run in some friendlies, trouncing countries like China and Japan. His last game was the second leg of “Copa Roca” (this shouldn’t be called “Superclassico”, but I’ll explain why later), which Brazil lost 2-1 but won the penalty challenge.
According to CBF, his back up will be announced in January. Rumor says the leader in the “run” is Corinthians’ coach Tite, who won the Copa Libertadores this year and the Brazilian National League in 2011, but the “dream” catch would be convincing Pep Guardiola to come back earlier from his sabbatical.
In all fairness, that’s an unexpected move. His team seemed to be clicking in the last run of games. Recalling Kaká even though he wasn’t being used by José Mourinho at Real Madrid was one of his good moves, and the team seemed to be gluing.
But at a personal level, I never really liked him. He has a pretty strange and obscure connection with Carlos Leite, who is his agent and also is an employee of many of Brazil’s current players. He insisted to call Porto and Shakhtar players who are clearly under Brazil’s level. He also personal issues with players like Real Madrid’s Marcelo and Fluminense’s Fred; issue that many times impeded him of calling those players to improve Brazil’s squad.
Maybe not only Mano Menezes but also Andrés Sanchez, Director of National Teams (yes, that job exists in CBF) can leave the job as he seemed to be the only one backing up Mano’s position. So, things can get much messier…
Stay tuned!
good to see you back!! thought you were retiring earlier, never a mano fan either, brazil should expect better than what they were getting with mano….
Haha, I had to get back with so important news coming! Have you read the post about Guardiola?
I did, Idk much about what entails to be an Nt coach but i would think that scolari has more going for him as far as nationality, an nt coach before, and success. Is guardiola your favorite choice for the job?