This Chile fan had to settle for watching the match on Copacabana beach -- but at least he wasn't stuck in the media centre. AP/Press Association Images
Letter from Brazil
'In the company of one waiter and three excitable customers, we watched the demise of tiki-taka'
Thousands of journalists are in Brazil to watch the World Cup – but it can be a harder task than you’d think, writes Mikey Stafford.
Mikey Stafford reports for TheScore.ie from Fortaleza
IN THE NEXT two days Brazil will expel 85 Chilean fans who tried to force their way into the Maracanã for their country’s historic 2-0 win over Spain.
Ironically their bid to gain access to the ultimate football viewing position ran aground in one of the worst — a World Cup stadium media centre.
Turning the sound up on the televisions can cause a diplomatic incident, as some broadcast journalist somewhere is always live on air, the FIFA feed features elevator muzak and computer game style replays at half-time instead of the punditry and amusing advertisements of any of the host broadcasters, and then there is the company.
It can be a little dispiriting to be in a room with several hundred professionals whose one common denominator should be a passion for football and find many seem to have very little interest in the World Cup game being played out on large, flat screen televisions right in front of them.
Waiting for Luiz Felipe Scolari’s press conference in the Estadio Castelao media centre on Monday I let out a yelp of excitement when Jan Vertonghen rugby tackled Algeria’s Sofiane Feghouli to hand the unfancied Africans a penalty against Belgium, the most over-hyped team in this World Cup bar the hosts.
My neighbour looked at me like I’d defecated in his corn flakes and for a second I thought I had interrupted an interview but no, he was just refreshing his Twitter feed, which is what 80% of the people in the media centre are doing 80% of the time.
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The media centre: a load of journalists hitting refresh on their Twitter feeds. Mikey Stafford
Mikey Stafford
Admittedly, some are working, but watching football while simultaneously working is the key to the gig. Apparently some in the media centre don’t give a fiddler’s.
On the opening day of the tournament we sprinted back from the Netherlands’ press conference to catch the end of the Brazil-Croatia game. I flopped in the first seat I saw but when I asked the guy next to me the score he just shrugged his shoulders and went back to his Twitter page. Who is he following on Twitter if he could not answer that question?
So I have empathy for those Chileans, who broke and entered in search of heaven but ended up in purgatory.
One of the first things you notice about covering a World Cup is how tricky it can be to actually watch the matches. Between travel, the unfortunate reality of work, your accommodation situation and the feeling that you’re not extracting the maximum from this magical country you’re inhabiting for more than a month, matches can pass you by.
So, life at the World Cup isn’t a day at the beach… except for yesterday, which was spent at the beach. The beach of the future, in fact. It was at Praia do Futuro, a short bus journey from Fortaleza’s more developed but polluted Beira Mar, where we had our first swim in the ocean after more than two weeks in Brazil.
Adelle Hughes
Adelle Hughes
It was warm and wonderful but after riding the waves of euphoria for a while the most pleasant of nagging guilts returned — the Netherlands and Australia had just kicked off. Did this beach of the future have a television?
No, it did not have a television. In its stead they had a cinema-sized screen in a grove surrounded by bars charging a beachside premium for food and booze.
We found a couple of seats, ate our bananas and waited to be told to buy something or leave. The terrible moment never came, so after another swim we returned and watched the first half of Spain and Chile on the big screen before catching a bus back to town and diving into the first restaurant we saw.
It was there, in the company of one waiter and three excitable customers, that we watched the reign of Spain come to an ignominious and swift end on a flat screen TV pock-marked by black blotches of dead pixels.
Having been in the press box in Salvador for the beginning of the end against the Netherlands it seemed like an apt aspect from which to view the demise of “tiki-taka”.
At least we were inside the pub. For England-Italy we walked three miles to watch the rumble in the jungle at the Salvador fan zone only to discover the FIFA party areas are only open for Brazil matches and fixtures in that particular city.
With the game underway we bought some beers from a nearby supermarket and watched from outside a packed pub, looking in. However a delay between their screens meant we knew by the roars of those inside that Claudio Marchisio’s goal, and the Daniel Sturridge equaliser, were coming, so we left at half-time.
The next bar we didn’t go into was my favourite so far. Through a window up a side alley we had a perfect view of the television and as we finished our cans we were entertained by the locals and, in particular, one dog.
The black mutt sat calmly on the street during the match, unmoved by the cheers of the many England-supporting Canadians, however when the rest of the crowd roared on Italy the dog lost its mind — running up and down the street barking.
Needless to say Mario Balotelli’s winner caused a mini-canine meltdown.
With their World Cup on the line this afternoon against Uruguay in São Paulo it seems not even the dogs in the street fancy England.
'In the company of one waiter and three excitable customers, we watched the demise of tiki-taka'
Mikey Stafford reports for TheScore.ie from Fortaleza
IN THE NEXT two days Brazil will expel 85 Chilean fans who tried to force their way into the Maracanã for their country’s historic 2-0 win over Spain.
Ironically their bid to gain access to the ultimate football viewing position ran aground in one of the worst — a World Cup stadium media centre.
Turning the sound up on the televisions can cause a diplomatic incident, as some broadcast journalist somewhere is always live on air, the FIFA feed features elevator muzak and computer game style replays at half-time instead of the punditry and amusing advertisements of any of the host broadcasters, and then there is the company.
It can be a little dispiriting to be in a room with several hundred professionals whose one common denominator should be a passion for football and find many seem to have very little interest in the World Cup game being played out on large, flat screen televisions right in front of them.
Waiting for Luiz Felipe Scolari’s press conference in the Estadio Castelao media centre on Monday I let out a yelp of excitement when Jan Vertonghen rugby tackled Algeria’s Sofiane Feghouli to hand the unfancied Africans a penalty against Belgium, the most over-hyped team in this World Cup bar the hosts.
My neighbour looked at me like I’d defecated in his corn flakes and for a second I thought I had interrupted an interview but no, he was just refreshing his Twitter feed, which is what 80% of the people in the media centre are doing 80% of the time.
Admittedly, some are working, but watching football while simultaneously working is the key to the gig. Apparently some in the media centre don’t give a fiddler’s.
On the opening day of the tournament we sprinted back from the Netherlands’ press conference to catch the end of the Brazil-Croatia game. I flopped in the first seat I saw but when I asked the guy next to me the score he just shrugged his shoulders and went back to his Twitter page. Who is he following on Twitter if he could not answer that question?
So I have empathy for those Chileans, who broke and entered in search of heaven but ended up in purgatory.
One of the first things you notice about covering a World Cup is how tricky it can be to actually watch the matches. Between travel, the unfortunate reality of work, your accommodation situation and the feeling that you’re not extracting the maximum from this magical country you’re inhabiting for more than a month, matches can pass you by.
So, life at the World Cup isn’t a day at the beach… except for yesterday, which was spent at the beach. The beach of the future, in fact. It was at Praia do Futuro, a short bus journey from Fortaleza’s more developed but polluted Beira Mar, where we had our first swim in the ocean after more than two weeks in Brazil.
It was warm and wonderful but after riding the waves of euphoria for a while the most pleasant of nagging guilts returned — the Netherlands and Australia had just kicked off. Did this beach of the future have a television?
No, it did not have a television. In its stead they had a cinema-sized screen in a grove surrounded by bars charging a beachside premium for food and booze.
We found a couple of seats, ate our bananas and waited to be told to buy something or leave. The terrible moment never came, so after another swim we returned and watched the first half of Spain and Chile on the big screen before catching a bus back to town and diving into the first restaurant we saw.
It was there, in the company of one waiter and three excitable customers, that we watched the reign of Spain come to an ignominious and swift end on a flat screen TV pock-marked by black blotches of dead pixels.
Having been in the press box in Salvador for the beginning of the end against the Netherlands it seemed like an apt aspect from which to view the demise of “tiki-taka”.
At least we were inside the pub. For England-Italy we walked three miles to watch the rumble in the jungle at the Salvador fan zone only to discover the FIFA party areas are only open for Brazil matches and fixtures in that particular city.
With the game underway we bought some beers from a nearby supermarket and watched from outside a packed pub, looking in. However a delay between their screens meant we knew by the roars of those inside that Claudio Marchisio’s goal, and the Daniel Sturridge equaliser, were coming, so we left at half-time.
The next bar we didn’t go into was my favourite so far. Through a window up a side alley we had a perfect view of the television and as we finished our cans we were entertained by the locals and, in particular, one dog.
The black mutt sat calmly on the street during the match, unmoved by the cheers of the many England-supporting Canadians, however when the rest of the crowd roared on Italy the dog lost its mind — running up and down the street barking.
Needless to say Mario Balotelli’s winner caused a mini-canine meltdown.
With their World Cup on the line this afternoon against Uruguay in São Paulo it seems not even the dogs in the street fancy England.
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Letter from Brazil World Cup 2014