Reuters Soccer Blog

The toughest job at the World Cup (part three)

Chile have reached the last 16 at the World Cup for only the third time in 50 years and we’re delighted to report that coach Marcelo Bielsa has hit form at the right time.

The tournament’s most verbose coach was in at the top of his game in the run-up to the match against Brazil, baffling the world’s media with his long-winded answers to the simplest of questions and brilliantly using the double negative on at least one occasion. Here are some excerpts from what was billed as a news conference but sounded more like a lecture in philosophy.

How important is the absence of your two central defenders? “I cannot not know the performance they have produced in the World Cup and, in addition to the way they are playing at the moment, they are valuable players but I believe we are capable of opting for their team mates who will resolve their absence with reliability and competence, you come to a World Cup with a number of options for each position, and the objective of this is that other options will appear and in the match against Brazil we will try to verify whether we have done this job correctly as this is one of the objectives of a team which competes in a tournament of this magnitude.” (and, yes, that was all one sentence)

You’ve lost your last seven matches against Brazil. Does this worry you?

“The psychological aspect is always important in a championship but the fact which you are harbouring, from our point of view acts, acts as a stimulus, it’s an opportunity to reverse a situation which is based on negative precedents…..it’s not that, because you lost in the past, you enter the field in a depressed mood for having lost previous matches. Previous matches are precedents which you can never ignore, you value and you respect the achievements of your opponents, in the case of Brazil even more so because of the dimension of their footballing history, but, in a humble way, we aspire to finding a small space for ourselves.”

To beat Brazil, a team needs to produce a perfect performance. Can Chile do this? “We all learn from mistakes which we make and from mistakes which we have seen other people make, and we try to avoid making them. This is the process of making a mistake and avoiding making it again, seeing how others make mistakes to avoid making the same mistake, it’s a process which is not stable, nor can it be measured.

Are you hoping to avenge the previous losses? “The word revenge is a term which implies the type of conduct which I try, wherever possible, to avoid invading my activities, especially when you are talking about a football match. The phrase “to avenge a defeat” in a footballing sense seems to me to be exaggerated. We lost the last games, the next one is a new chapter and it also does not seem correct to me to anticipate that you are going to obtain something that you have not yet obtained. So I would like to exempt myself from fantasising over this position which you have put forward to me.”

The toughest job at the World Cup (part 2)

Chile’s 1-0 win over Switzerland, with a controversial goal and a dubious red card for their opponents, may have been highly controversial but there was no contesting the words of their coach Marcelo Bielsa afterwards — simply because it was almost impossible to understand what he was saying.

After our first excursion into the mind of Bielsa, here are some more gems from the spectacularly verbose Argentine, whose team need a draw against Spain on Friday to make sure of a second round place.

On his team’s chances against Spain: “In football, it is never convenient to interpret something which has still not happened. The sport’s great appeal is that the things which one expects to happen before the game are rarely confirmed by what happens on the pitch.”

Chile’s performance at the World Cup so far: “The World Cup qualifiers were a step which the team resolved in favourable terms and the next step is reaching the second stage of the World Cup. As the objective has not been reached, the evaluation will have to be made at a later stage, because for me, one always has to make the evaluation when you have at your disposal the totality of the elements which the team has offered. The first evaluation is not opportune, because one of the things which you are chasing has still not been obtained. Football is unexpected and offers nuances which one does not imagine.”

His view of the match against Switzerland: “We counted with the advantage which having an extra man at this level presupposes. But, the most eye-catching thing was that even in such conditions, they still had a chance to level the match. The Swiss tactics were legitimate in my view. It is a system which has some important successes amongst its assets.”

There will doubtless be more classics from the “Madman” when his team play Spain on Friday.

PHOTO: Chile’s national soccer team head coach Marcelo Bielsa attends a news conference at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Port Elizabeth June 20, 2010. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse

The toughest job at the World Cup

Can there be a more difficult job at the World Cup than providing the simultaneous translation when Chile coach Marcelo Bielsa is speaking?

The enigmatic Bielsa, who coached his native Argentina at the 2002 World Cup, has a unique manner of expressing himself — he actually says much the same things as other coaches but talks like an eccentric professor.

He are some gems El Loco (the Madman) produced after seeing his team beat Honduras 1-0 on Wednesday, their first win at the World Cup since 1962.

On Chile’s performance: “The sensation which the game has given me is that Chile did not speculate nor did we stop attacking because of the simple fact that we were winning, and the team respected the method which I had elected to elaborate our attacks.”

What about giving Chile their first World Cup win for 48 years?: “We focus more attention on trying to make these points profitable and for this to happen it is necessary for us to win again, or to try and win again, in the next match, because the objective for all of us is more closely connected to trying to qualify for the next round than the records.”

How did he feel about the support from the Chilean fans in the stadium?: “One enjoys the affection which the fans transmit to the footballers and try to reward it with energy. The support always gives us more strength, and apart from that it generates a feeling of gratitude which I would like to transmit. Having said that, it is very difficult to quantity to what extent this has an effect, but when you always feel appreciated, it improves the possibilities of the person who is indicated in that particular manner.”

Argentine Bielsa becomes Chile’s unlikeliest sex symbol (Update)

Marcelo Bielsa’s feats – leading Chile’s national team to the third spot in the World Cup qualifiers and just one win from a ticket to South Africa 2010 – have turned him into one of Chile’s most beloved figures. Men say he should run for president; women rank the introverted coach a sex symbol.

His popularity is backed by numbers. A poll in El Mercurio newspaper ranks Bielsa the best trainer in Chile’s soccer history, above Nelson Acosta who took the team to the second round of France 1998 and Fernando Riera who led “La Roja” to the third spot in Chile 1962.

But passion for the Argentine transcends the soccer pitch and enters the realm of the altar. In the most recent act of fervour, a group of fans is asking the Vatican to canonise him. The site asks fans to support the effort by lighting 100,000 virtual candles for “San Marcelino.”

Bielsa, who is pictured with a halo on an altar, wearing the red jumper of the Chilean squad, even has prayers in his honour. “Blessed San Marcelino, lead your serious glare towards our fans and fill our nation with your glory,” reads one of them. It adds: “The nation you’ve chosen to change history and bring only triumphs to La Roja.”

The site asks for three miracles from “the saint”: Chile’s classification to the next World Cup, reaching round two, and winning the tournament.

The first miracle could be granted if “Saint Marcelino’s” Chile beats Colombia in Medellin on Saturday. For now fans can only pray and hope the miracle is achieved and their team can come back to a World Cup after 12 years of purgatory.

Sunday update: I guess we can say, All that and then some, after Chile clinched qualification. Here’s how we reported it: