I’m from the group that supports Neymar in the Brazilian team. Idelber Avelar classified me and my friends in this Sheetas part of a “dementia circus”.
I have nothing against circus art. After all, appreciation for shows and bodily intelligence are part of the 34-year-old Santos striker’s unique qualities.
But I have reservations about how the writer used the term dementia. Somewhat inelegant, another somewhat disrespectful towards health conditions.
The professor, who is also the author of books on politics, claims that we were unable to present numbers to justify calling up number 10. Fact.
Talking about numbers in football always seemed like a risky idea to me. Not that I’m a denier, but I see sport defying statistics frequently. Gen Z gamers have demonstrated this.
Frenchman Rayan Cherki, 22, from Manchester City, and Spanish Lamine Yamal, 18, from Barcelona, are some of the voices praying in public for the playful value of sport.
I mention young people in this mathematical question because I don’t want my younger friends to say that Neymar was better than Maradona just because of the number of goals he scored in his career. It would be an outrage, a scandal for both sides. There are variables beyond that. The Brazilian scored more than 450, the Argentine reached 345.
And God forbid I hear Pelé’s name in vain. Have you ever thought about someone inventing that Neymar is better than the King just because he scored more official goals for the Brazilian team? Another scandal.
It would also be foolhardy to compare them based on World Cup or Olympic titles. Or even by number of cards, carts on rainy days or the average time to lose the ball during a game against Corinthians.
The argument that (part of) us, circus people, present about Neymar’s urgency in the selection follows another path: it is inspired by fantastic realism, which treats truth and magic as one. The star makes us believe.
The self-esteem that accompanies this creed goes beyond the World Cup itself. Professor Luiz Antônio Simas said on the podcast “Como Nascem os Grandes” that Pelé and Garrincha, a black man and an indigenous man, were the possibility for Brazil to function as a nation in their time.
Now Mano Brown frequently points out the parallelism between Neymar’s career and the aesthetic and political movements of the black population in the 21st century.
This becoming of the mohawk, sun-kissed skin, sneakers with suits and funk made my friends and I happy in a time of RBD, Harry Potter, High School Musical, Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and the like.
Neymar’s movements put a limit on this clear identity. Our identity has also been weakened. Our lobby is not that good.
It’s difficult to convince anyone that Neymar in the World Cup is opening the team’s Afrofuturist path. Even with Vini, Raphinha and others citing their partner’s influence on their career. It’s even harder to convince a white Italian of all this.
It is also not enough to say that some players on Ancelotti’s list are reserves at their clubs and are not even at a physical peak to withstand the rotation of supposed modern football.
We want Neymar in the World Cup because we support the Brazil of Pelé and Garrincha. If it helps you win the trophy, great. If that’s the reason for the defeat, too bad. Still, we want it. Out of respect for the legacy of that future.
