FEATURE SERIES: Football's Greatest International Rivalries - Brazil & Argentina

In this excerpt of the fourth part of a mini-series during the World Cup, available in full to subscribers on Patreon, the team look at the greatest international footballing rivalries, continuing with Brazil and Argentina. The full episode is available on the World Cup Football Etc/World Sports Etc Patreon page: 

https://tinyurl.com/FriendsofWorldSportsetcPatreon

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:25

Hello and welcome to World Cup Football, etc., with me, Paul Schmidroschka, and today with the fourth and last teaser in our miniseries on the greatest football rivalries in the world. And if you want to listen to the whole story, you can find the link to our Patreon page in the show notes and the podcast description. Now, after Spain versus Morocco, the United States versus Mexico and France versus Germany, today we arrive at the biggest football rivalry in Latin America. Record five times FIFA World Cup winner Brazil versus three times World Cup winner Argentina, playing catch-up with its South American neighbor. The Superclassico de las Americas, or the Classico Sudamericano, is one of the most captivating and emotionally charged rivalries out there. And who would be more qualified to speak on that topic than my co-host and Latin America correspondent for more than 20 years? The man himself, Jonathan Frederick Bonfield.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

The man himself. How are you, Paul? I'm doing great. How are you? Good, thank you. Um, obviously, contextually, we're going to be talking about Brazil, Argentina. Brazil have just been knocked out of the World Cup by Norway. So it's a particularly kind of um inauspicious moment, I guess, to uh to to mark something of Brazil's descent as well.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

Yeah, absolutely. Um uh we are uh once I I pressed the recording button, that was actually the moment when the referee um blew the final whistle on that match. And uh yeah, Brazil is out, and uh Brazil definitely is in a similar situation as Germany, probably even a more difficult one, um, because uh it was not such a clear defeat. But um there is something fundamentally wrong with uh Brazilian national football. And uh I mean this uh this is uh the case, I think, for you can basically make make an argument for the last um 20 years, uh starting with 2002, the last World Cup win. Um but today um we're speaking about Brazil versus uh Argentina. Um let's first get into the history of this great football rivalry between the two largest countries by size in South America. Back on at which point in time and why did this rivalry start? Is it a purely football-based rivalry or is there actually more to it?

SPEAKER_01 2:48

No, I think it's I mean it is it is very much a football-based rivalry, but it is also broader. I think you you also have to um recognize that Brazil and Argentina are two of um South America's largest countries, that they are their sort of economic powerhouses as well. And then not only do you have that sort of level of uh I guess sort of identity rivalry, but it also um sort of amplifies across the fact that of course Brazil is uh Portuguese speaking, Argentina is Spanish speaking, so they have kind of quite different cultural sort of histories and heritage as well, and that's evolved pretty in in different ways well, even though of course, you know, they are Latin America and there are things which which draw them together for the um as regards the footballing component, the first match was in 19 uh 14, and I think it's sort of it's not a particular moment that um that that has meant that there is this super uh super clásico, classico sudamericano uh rivalry. I think it's definitely evolved over time and it's it it um features a number of different things. I mean, of course, really important is the fact that both are um there's a kind of a balance there, both are regularly ranked amongst the best in the world. Brazil won five World Cups, Argentina three, but then by the same token, Argentina won 16 Copa Américas to Brazil's nine, and not just at a national level as well, but also their clubs are regular the best in the Copa Libertadores and other uh regional tournaments. And then I would also say it even extends into beyond teams themselves, like this ongoing, of course, historical discussion about Pele and Maradona and um and the those two sort of iconic figures and how they match up against each other. Interestingly, for for a long time there was this sort of perceived sense that they were rivals, that they didn't like each other, but actually they there's there's a number of um of uh of moments where they sort of came together. There's a famous moment where they played music together in a in a recording, and there was a lot of um sort of mutual respect there. Pele was of course a little older than Maradona, but they were there wasn't really much that sort of split them in terms of uh in terms of their, I guess, where when they appeared in a sort of world uh context. And I and I think it's also not just those two. I mean, if you look, just look at the list of players that both both uh nations have produced, uh, I mean, of course, Lionel Messi now, uh Freddy Stefano as well, and then the for Argentina and then Brazil. I mean, how many do you want to mention? Roberto Carlos, Ramadinho, Ronaldo, and so on. So I think it's a particular rivalry because they're so um sort of level pegging in terms of their quality and their history, that it's very difficult to sort of pull them apart. And by the same token, I'd say that there have been some difficult moments between the two sides and the two nations, but I would also say that um that actually there is a deep mutual respect uh there as well. That uh, although that sometimes spills over into fan, it's a problematic fan behavior, that actually um they they both know that the the existence of the other actually gives more sense to who it is that they are as well.