The Seleção is back at last.

Brazil vs. Bolivia

Arena Corinthians, São Paulo, October 9, 2020

Kickoff: 8:30 PM EDT / 9:30 PM BRT / 12:30 AM GMT

US TV / Streaming: Pay-per-view only

Likely Starting Lineup: Weverton; Danilo, Thiago Silva, Marquinhos, Renan Lodi; Casemiro, Douglas Luiz, Coutinho; Neymar (Éverton Ribeiro), Roberto Firmino, Everton Cebolinha.

Bench: Ederson, Santos, Gabriel Menino, Felipe, Rodrigo Caio, Alex Telles, Fabinho, Bruno Guimarães, Éverton Ribeiro (Neymar), Matheus Cunha, Richarlison, Rodrygo.

Notes and Storylines

It’s been eleven months, but we’re finally going to see Brazil play again. It’s perhaps a little awkward to be immediately back in action with a game of real consequence—this is the first matchday of CONMEBOL World Cup qualifying—but every team’s in the same boat, and Bolivia at home is the best opposition we could’ve asked for to ease into the gauntlet of World Cup qualifying.

Perhaps the pandemic-enforced break will end up being for the best. Brazil’s last games, at the end of 2019, were seriously disappointing viewing experiences, aimless, disjointed performances from a team that was either still a bit hungover from the Copa América or had truly lost its way. If Brazil plays badly this time, we’ll have to blame the lack of training time or something instead.

Bolivia at home as our first game is an odd proposition, because it’s as close to a gimme as you’re going to get in CONMEBOL qualifying, and at a later point in the schedule it could serve as a decent opportunity to change things up and try some new players in a relatively easy game. Up first, however, and especially after such a long time away, the main expectation for Brazil is surely just to start out with three points on the board. Nonetheless, Tite has promised a fairly experimental lineup for this game. Some of it’s enforced (Alisson and Gabriel Jesus are out injured, Arthur wasn’t called because he’s lacked playing time, and Neymar is questionable with a back problem); some of it isn’t (Weverton will start in goal rather than Ederson, Douglas Luiz and Coutinho will play in midfield, Everton Cebolinha will play on the right wing).

I’m certainly raising my eyebrow at some of these choices. I still remember Weverton’s perpetually shaky performance at the 2016 Olympics, though if there’s ever a time to not just give Ederson the start in goal, it’s now that he’s committing a clanger in practically every other game for Man City. The selection of Douglas Luiz over Bruno Guimarães also bothers me; Tite’s obviously looking for an Arthur type, but with an extremely attack-minded and not very physical front four, putting all the onus on Casemiro to protect the back four could be problematic. (Plus, at this point, Bruno is just a better player in both directions than Luiz: in addition to being a solid defender, he’s capable of threading penetrating balls through to his forwards when he arrives in the final third; Luiz, by contrast, was almost totally anonymous in Aston Villa’s incredible 7-2 win over Liverpool on Sunday, playing no part in any of their goals despite Liverpool constantly leaving themselves wide open to forward passes of any kind.)

The attack is the most interesting part of this lineup, and the most eyebrow-raising. My first guess is that, with Gabriel Jesus unavailable, Tite is going to try and play as a poor man’s Liverpool, with Roberto Firmino coming deep and Neymar and Cebolinha running inside into the space. It might work; Neymar and Cebolinha are certainly quick enough and good enough with the ball at their feet to fill in for Sadio Mané and Mo Salah. But it’s questionable whether either one will be much for making the sort of runs required for this to work (Neymar used to be excellent with his movement in this regard, but hasn’t had to exercise this skill quite so much since becoming the main man at PSG), and Cebolinha isn’t nearly the goalscorer that Salah is (yet… fingers crossed), even before you consider that he’s right-footed and will be suck out on the right wing because Neymar has dibs on the left. Plus, with Philippe Coutinho in attacking midfield, you’re packing the attack with guys who want the ball at the feet rather than moving into space. If Neymar can’t start, Tite’s plan to replace him with the left-footed Éverton Ribeiro at least solves Cebolinha’s problem, as he’ll presumably move back to the left, but it still means that there’s nobody in the attack inclined to be making runs into space.

Which all leads to something I’ve become increasingly interested in seeing, and which I’m kind of disappointed we won’t see tomorrow, at least starting out. Brazil has a lack of quality strikers. This isn’t news to anyone. (Pedro is at least offering some glimmers of hope for the future right now, but who knows.) But we do have a decent number of players who, though they’ve shown themselves to not really be capable of leading the line on their own, are still real threats in the penalty box in the right circumstances. This fits pretty much every forward in this squad: Roberto Firmino (who can’t lead the line as a more traditional 9 than he plays at Liverpool), Richarlison, Matheus Cunha, even Rodrygo. (Not to mention Gabriel Jesus and arguably Gabigol as well.) So my modest proposal is that we try two up top.

The reasons are obvious: not only have several of our forwards demonstrated that they do better when having another player around the box to combine with, but a strike partnership will keep a singular player from having to shoulder the overwhelming responsibility of being Brazil’s main goal threat. Tite’s experimented with this on occasion with GJ and Firmino, and in the leadup to last year’s Copa América GJ and Richarlison combined very well in the box more than once. In my more demented moments, I even envision something like the 4-3-1-2 from Dunga’s days: one of the two forwards operating wider a la Robinho (this could open the door for Cebolinha or Neymar to be a part of this), Neymar or Coutinho in a true number 10 role behind them, and a solid midfield trio, taking advantage of our depth there and providing cover for our fullbacks to come forward and provide width. Seeing as our central and defensive midfielders are more capable of picking a pass than Gilberto Silva and Felipe Melo, it might even be halfway tolerable to watch.

Hmm, what else? Oh, teams will be able to make up to five substitutions in these games. Hopefully that motivates Tite to experiment a little more than usual if we’re up by three or four goals late on?

And here’s my prediction: Brazil 3-0 Bolivia. I just feel like it’s going to take a little while to shake the rust off (especially if Neymar can’t play), and this was the scoreline in our somewhat awkward start to last year’s Copa América. Plus, we’re all well familiar by now with Tite’s ability to get results while being vaguely disappointing, and do you really think a pandemic will change that?