It was a final worth dying for as it was a contest between the two super powers of the soccer world. Brazil, the host nation, won the battle defeating the present world champions Spain by a margin of three to nil. This has given a much needed boost to the hurt ego of the erstwhile champions and a boost to their confidence also as they start preparations for the next world cup in 2014. In fact, with this win, Brazil have ended a three year winning streak of Spain that lasted 29 games. Luiz Fellipe, the Brazilian coach, though he was happy and satisfied with the result, cautioned his players to work hard for the next year’s world cup. But he also added that Brazil got the much needed confidence with this game.
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Fred scored twice in the 2nd and the 47th minute while Neymar scored a goal in the 44th minute to give Brazil a 3-0 victory over Spain. Incidentally, this was the third straight victory in Confederations Cup for Brazil, and it has not lost a match on home soil since 1975. On the other hand, Spain, which had not lost a game since the opening match of the world cup two years ago, found nothing going their way in the match. Sergio Ramos got a penalty kick but it went wide of the goal and to compound the miseries of the Spanish team, Gerard Pique, the Spanish defender was shown a red card by the Dutch referee for doing a foul that involved Neymar in the dying moments of the match.
After the match, the Spanish coach Vicente Del Bosque accepted the superiority of the Brazilian players saying they piled up pressure on Spanish players right from the start. The fact that Brazil got an early goal allowed them to dominate the Spanish defense throughout the duration of the match. Spain can be considered as the best national team of the 21st century as it has not just won the world cup in 2010 but also has European titles in 2008 and 2012 to confirm its top ranking.
Brazil, which had lost in the quarterfinals of the last two FIFA World Cups and was slowly dipping among the soccer playing nations with a rank as low as 22 between Ghana and Mali, has suddenly found a new lease of life and people have already started to say that the champion team is back in contention. This roar was there in the crowd that was watching the match live in Maracana stadium in Brazil.
It has to be said though that Spain, despite being undefeated in the last three years, had not faced Brazil even a single time. The last time Spain played against Brazil was way back in 1999 and that too in a friendly match. All said and done, this was a match that can work wonders to revive the fortunes of Brazil who are five times world champions.
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