As a Brazilian I've been watching the soccer matches at the Olympics but one interesting fact caught my attention: neither the men or women's national team has ever won a gold medal at the Olympics. While we consider ourselves to be a perennial power in soccer I was awed at how we are unable to win at the second biggest stage, the Olympics, so I will dive in recent history and take a look on why Brazil's soccer has been unable to get the Gold.
Men's side:
Olympic soccer is not as important in the men's side as the World Cup is still the most prominent competition for all nations, but it is still a respectable title that a country would like to have. The conflict between the IOC and FIFA in order to make the Olympics not compete with the World Cup led to several rules that makes soccer at the Olympics as more of a development tournament for the countries youngest stars. As explained by FOX the rules are quite complex as the competition is limited to players under twenty-three but each team gets three exceptions and also since the Olympics coincide with European leagues, those clubs might deny their players from performing at the Olympics. Enough with the rules though, let's take a look at the Olympic history of soccer; it has been played in 26 Olympics with various teams as the Soviet Union and Cameroon claiming Gold. Brazil has won three silver medals (84,88,12) and two bronze medals (96,08) what is considerably a lot if compared to the other nations, but why it has never been successful in getting the gold ?
Let's take a look at its silver medals matches and see why. In '84 Brazil lost to France in the finals by a score of 2-0, and while the players in both teams are almost unknown it comes to my attention that Dunga was playing on that team. I think that '84 was more of Brazil bringing young players to develop, and as a consequence, the result was a silver medal. However, in the 88 Olympics, the Brazilian team was looking stronger than ever as it had Romario, Neto, Taffarel and Bebeto all which would win the World Cup in '94. While they were young Romario was already playing great soccer at Barcelona and was definitely one of Brazil's main offensive threats during the '88 Olympics, but once again they fell short against the Soviet Union losing by 2-1. A similar situation happened in 2012 when Brazil brought Neymar, Hulk, Ganso and Alexandre Pato, all players of great caliber that were peaking during that period but once again fell shortly against Mexico in the finals. Both these occasions are weird as Brazil had a clear superiority in raw talent but in soccer, a lot can change during the match and the most skilled team does not always win (take a look at Iceland v. England in the recent Euro). Since the Olympics only come four in four years the Brazilian raw prospects led by their veterans might have not been lucky enough to get a gold medal and this is what makes soccer a great sport, its unpredictability.
Women's side:
Women's soccer in the Olympics is much more recent and has started only in 1996, making it only six total tournaments since its creation. Unlike men's soccer, each nation brings its best team as the Olympics is seen as important as the World Cup (that is why the US bring Solo, Morgan, and others). In these six Olympics games, the United States have won four gold medals and one silver and Brazil only two silvers (04,08). In both final runs, the Brazilian team was stopped by the United States. While Brazil has five-time FIFA World Player of the Year, Marta, soccer remains a team sport and the Brazilian team just could not defeat the United States. One of the reasons I believe this happens is that soccer in Brazil is still considered a "man's" game what leads to girls being reluctant in pursuing a soccer career while in the US it is the completely opposite since the female National's team soccer achieved so much success in comparison to its male counterpart that more girls are attracted to the sport.
Future?
Well, the Olympics in Rio are a great year to break this taboo and both teams have great shots at bringing the needed gold. The women will be facing Sweden whom they beat 5-1 in the preliminary phase while the men face Honduras in the semifinals. Both teams could advance to the finals and face Germany to bring back the needed glory to the country (or just don't lose 7-1, nothing can be worse than that). So keep an eye in the soccer at the Olympics as both taboos can be broken this year!
