Brazil vs. Chile

Estádio Olímpico Nilton Santos, Rio de Janeiro, July 2, 2021

Kickoff: 8:00 PM EDT / 9:00 PM BRT / 12:00 AM GMT

US TV / Streaming: FS1, TUDN, Univision

Likely Starting Lineup: It’s a mystery!!!! (But Ederson will start in goal.)

Potential absences: Renan Lodi’s health is unclear, and SofaScore lists Éder Militão as “doubtful” as well. In the other direction, Bragantino center-back Léo Ortiz has come in for the injured Felipe, who has been cut from the squad.

Notes And Storylines

It’s finally the knockout round, and that means it’s time to reap the fruits of our experimentation in the group stage. What did Tite learn, truly? Did he find out anything of import beyond who can’t play as a number 9 at this level? We will know soon. As is customary, Tite is playing his cards close to his chest for a more difficult game, so I don’t know much about the lineup at this point beyond that Ederson will start in goal. Has what Tite considers his “best XI” changed all that much? (Based on what he used in recent World Cup qualifying matches, my current guess is it’s Ederson; Danilo, Marquinhos, Thiago Silva, Alex Sandro; Casemiro, Fred, Lucas Paquetá/Everton Ribeiro; Gabriel Jesus, Richarlison, Neymar.)

Speaking of the knockout rounds, the last two group-stage games gave us some cause for concern. If a Copa América quarterfinal or semifinal is tied at the end of 90 minutes, it goes straight to penalties—no extra time. It took an unbelievably late winner for us to beat Colombia in our third group stage game, and in our final game against Ecuador, we created very little after conceding an equalizer early in the second half (albeit with Neymar being rested). Tite’s general “control things early and then hit ’em when they get tired” strategy has been pretty effective at winning games, but it’s meant that Brazil has created relatively few chances (and only four of its 14 goals in the last month) before the 60th minute. If there’s any place where it’s likely to backfire, it’s against a team that knows it can hold out for penalties. Brazil’s record in penalty shootouts has been very good recently, but we absolutely should not leave our chances of advancing to that sort of crapshoot.

As for our opposition, Chile are certainly diminished, but for better or worse they still have many of the attributes that marked them over the past decade. They can still combine beautifully or get physical as the need arises, they’re still very tough to break down, and they still have a bad tendency to score far less than the quality of their play would suggest. But they’ve struggled through their worst Copa América group stage campaign since at least 2007, winning just one of their four games and scoring only three goals. Considering we have a good recent and historical record against Chile (scores tend to be close, but we almost always come out on top), perhaps this portends an unusually easy quarterfinal win, but I can’t help but think that we’ll be fighting something of a wounded animal. Chile have only scored three goals in this tournament, but they’ve also only conceded four, and I’m sure they’ll make life difficult for us, especially if they can press Brazil and/or find a goal before the 60th minute. My somewhat dour prediction is Brazil 1-1 Chile, though hopefully my pessimism is unwarranted.

If it goes to penalties, I will predict the winner only by this metric: did Paraguay beat Peru in the day’s earlier quarterfinal matchup? If so, we will win, and face Paraguay in the semifinal. If not, we will lose. Why do I think this? Well, look at our recent history in the Copa América. Facing Paraguay in a penalty shootout is a rite of passage. The one time Paraguay fell in the group stage, we fell at the same stage too, because we could no longer face them in the knockout rounds. If it becomes impossible to fulfill the rite, we cannot advance. Î̷͔t̵̰̍ ̴̤̊i̴̳̋s̵̩̚ ̶̟̇w̴̧̚ṙ̷̫i̶̡͑t̸͉͠t̷̘͑e̸̩͊n̶̫͝.̴̥̀ ̶̃͜W̵̑ͅe̴̙̎ ̵̘̽ã̴͙ṟ̸̿e̴̞̔ ̵̗̿c̶̨̓û̶̻r̴͓͒ş̵̛ȇ̴̯d̵͎̽.̵̢͝