The Brazilian Confederation Cup already took off last Saturday, as kind of a testing-tool for next year’s enormous sport event – the 2014 World Cup. However, the modest tournament has evoked unexpected protests, massive in size, against what the protesters refer to as the ‘government spending the poor and the middle classes’ money and give it to the rich and wealthy’.
The anti-government protesters have already brought out to the streets an estimated of one million people across the country, all saying the same thing – we don’t want your bloody world cup – we want food and water!
One of the most incredible things about this protest is its heterogenic nature. This is not a certain district or a specific city that feel this way – we’re talking about 80 different cities, across the enormous South-American country with an outstanding display of anger directed at the corruption, high prices and lack of investment in public services.
In the meantime, FIFA – the global football association, has stated that canceling the Confederation Cup is not – nor has it ever has been – an option. Pekka Odriozola said that “At no stage, I repeat at no stage has FIFA, the Local Organizing Committee nor the federal government discussed or considered canceling the Confederations Cup.”
So what do we, the football supporters across the world, who don’t fully understand what the whole thing is about can do in the meantime?
Well, we can at least enjoy the high level of football that being displayed, especially by the three leading teams – Spain, Brazil and Italy.
Spain has by now played two matches: they have beaten Uruguay 2:1 (scored Pedro Rodriguez and Roberto Soldado for Spain and Luis Suarez for Uruguay) and have also defeated the humble Tahiti side 10:0 (scored Fernando Torres 4, David Villa 3, David Silva 2 and Juan Mata.
Here are all the goals and highlights from Spain’s games:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdLny5ZjKSA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oy_NJP6JK7I
Brazil, from their part, got their shiny new jewelry, named Neimar, to show off with. They have beaten Japan by the score of 3:0 (scored Neymar, Paulinho and Jo), and have also managed to take on Mexico on a tough game ending at 2:0 for the home team (scored: Neymar and Jo).
Here are all the goals and highlights from Brazil’s games:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BspY6lhCiKs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KX7mwuNGJw
Italy so far has also managed to stay on top – beating both Mexico and Japan. They won 2:1 against Mexico (Andrea Pirlo and Mario Balotelli scored for Italy. Javier Hernandez scored for Mexico). They also managed to win 4:3 in what was quite a thriller against Japan (Daniele De Rossi, Atsuto Uchida, Mario Balotelli ad Sebastian Giovinco scored for Italy. Keisuke Honda, Shinji Kagawa and Shinji Okazaki scored for Japan).
Here are all the goals and highlights from Italy’s games:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaYl4JoKNZA
