None of the world’s renowned soccer analysts could have imagined that host, Argentina and the highly rated Brazil would have failed to reach the last four in the just concluded COPA America, considering their galaxy of super stars.
But thelesson that should be drawn from the tournament which didn’t leave up to itsbilling is the fact that stars don’t exactly make a good team, but acombination of players who are dedicated, industrious and understand each otherwith a long period of blending.
The biggestproblem with Argentina and Brazil super stars like their Nigeriancounterpart in Africa are their lack ofcommitment and patriotism. Another problem often faced by these teams is lackof consistency in terms of playing time. Experience has shown over the yearsthat teams that win tournaments and championships are those whose players aretotally committed as well as play together for a long period of time and notnecessarily the assemblage of super stars.
An examplethat readily comes to mind in club football is Real Madrid, despite itsintimidating assemblage of super stars in the last five years, the club hasn’twon the expected laurels save for the Spanish Cup won last season by the JoseMourinho tutored side. World Champion, Spain, did not win the World Cupjust because of Xavi and Iniesta, but due to the team being together for areasonable period. This is equally evident in the performance of Uruguay at the mundial and the just concludedCOPA America where she won the prestigious trophy by beating Paraguay 3:0 atthe final.
To refreshour memory, Brazilwon trophies in the past when majority of its players were based in herdomestic league and had enough playing time together. The Nigeria Super Eaglesteam that won Tunisia’94 was put together by the self styled DutchGerian,Clemens Westerhof in 1989 during ECOWAS Cup.
The summaryof this analysis is that a compact and result oriented team is the handiwork ofconsistency, good management and players’ dedication and not the assemblage ofsuper stars.
Copyright: Fresh Angle International (www.freshangleng.com)
ISSN 2354 - 4104
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