Kylian Mbappé irritated South American football in May, when he went out to say that Argentina and Brazil do not play “high level” games in the process of qualifying for the World Cup.
Interviewed by a sports channel in Brazil, the star of the French national team stoked that soccer in South America “is not as advanced as in Europe.” And he noted that the most recent world champions — including his own country in 2018 — have been Europeans.
The responses to the striker included all kinds of comments, nuanced between the affront for feeling slighted and perplexity.
Lionel Messi, Mbappé’s partner in Paris Saint-Germain, came out to say that Europeans have no idea of the demands of the South American qualifiers, at the height of La Paz or the heat of the Caribbean coast of Colombia.
The Brazilian coach Tite underlined that the competition in South America towards the World Cup has a higher degree of difficulty than Europe: “We don’t have, with all due respect, to play with Azerbaijan… we don’t have those games that give you a break ”.
Sebastián Abreu, the retired striker whose “Panenka” penalty in 2010 sealed the victory that catapulted Uruguay to the World Cup semifinals for the first time in four decades, said that Mbappé needed to read more on Wikipedia: “Because they play with Europeans does not mean that those Europeans are top-tier.”
South America is puffing out its chest as the World Cup approaches. His four selections throb something big.
Brazil wants its sixth title, sheltering with Neymar and a litter of young extremes. Argentina boasts of an undefeated 35 games and Messi is happy and playing like never before with his national team.
Uruguay is excited to go far thanks to Luis Suárez and Edinson Cavani in what would be their fourth and last World Cup, escorted by Federico Valverde and Darwin Núñez, talents under 25 who have stood out in their European clubs in recent months.
And Ecuador returns after missing out on Russia 2018 and —with a promising generation of young people— has between eyebrows and eyebrows to draw a group in which it will face the Netherlands, Senegal and the host Qatar.
All intend to break the European yoke in the cup.
But they also have a gloomy trend in mind. It has been 20 years since the last time a South American team was proclaimed world champion.
Since Brazil added its fifth star in Japan and South Korea in 2002, the Selacao have crashed every time they met an opponent from Europe in the knockout stage, including the 7-1 debacle against eventual champions Germany in 2014.
Argentina can say it has been able to beat Europeans in those instances, but it eventually capitulated, as France did in the round of 16 in Russia four years ago.
There is one factor that is immediately pointed out to explain the prolonged drought in the World Cups: Europe has money hand over fist to invest in the development of its young talents. And, recently, the pandemic and the new UEFA Nations League significantly reduced the number of games between top teams from Europe and South America.
“Today the Europeans, physically, are above the South Americans. You can see that they play at a different speed”, commented Iván Zamorano, the retired Chilean striker who played for Real Madrid and Inter Milan. “They are in a dimension just ahead of the South American footballer.”
Zamorano is envious of the ability of European youth academies to “bring out players year after year who can make history in the future.”
“The South American soccer player continues to be superior in technique, that quality of the street that makes him different,” Zamorano told The Associated Press. “But things are missing, the resources, the infrastructure, his work methods. The possibility of looking for that boy who has different conditions sometimes costs in South America and the boy gets lost along the way.
“We have to do something different that can cause that difficulty for Europeans to win a World Cup,” he added.
But Zamorano also believes that for a while — perhaps the last three World Cups — he hadn’t seen Argentina and Brazil so well on the eve of the tournament.
“From the point of view of competitiveness, the South American teams are going to fight the Europeans equally,” he predicted.
Luiz Felipe Scolari, the Brazil coach who was crowned in 2002 with the sensational “Triple R” in attack, made up of Ronaldo, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho, is of the opinion that the current European dominance is just a phase.
Felipao says that Brazil have the attributes to reign in Qatar, but that his country may be better equipped to take the title in 2026 by highlighting the potential of a new generation. This includes striker Endrick, the 16-year-old who last month became the earliest player to score a goal for Palmeiras in the Brazilian league.
“The guys that we have now can give us the result that we hope for,” Scolari told the AP. “But you can’t push them to achieve everything. Maybe in four years we can put pressure on them to achieve everything, because they are going to arrive at their peak, with 26 and 27 years.
The leaders of South American football are trying to ensure that their teams do not fall further behind the Europeans — Brazil’s Corinthians in 2012 were the only team from the area to win the FIFA Club World Cup since 2007.
Alejandro Domínguez, the president of CONMEBOL, hopes to close an agreement with UEFA that allows the teams to compete in the League of Nations.
“UEFA is working much better than CONMEBOL for 30 years. They have results that are difficult for us because we have to start from scratch and from behind,” said Domínguez in a recent meeting with journalists in Buenos Aires. “The League of Nations that they have is a success. Our teams continue to play friendlies and all, with few exceptions, are deficient”.
“What are we doing wrong that we are not world champions?” asked the Paraguayan leader. “We have to find the formula. I hope it happens this year. It would really be a consolidation… Unfortunately our youngsters leave very early, it is an issue that CONMEBOL is concerned about. We are trying to generate more and more income so that the clubs do not have that suffocation and the need to send them”.