When MBappé rolls on the table following a muddy joke from his trainer, Christophe Galtier, on the mode of travel of the PSG stars, the media vox populi ignites, believing that footballers do not have to answer and take a position on all social issues. Footballers, according to the invaluable Pierre Desproges, “these hordes in their sweat-laced underpants who compete on the grass for the tiny honor of being champions of the ball at their feet”, are not doomed, commentators argue, to interfere everywhere in public debate. But who can seriously believe that they all live in a bubble, protected from the vagaries of this world ?
Neymar, the star striker of PSG, gives us blatant proof of this. On the eve of the presidential election in Brazil he announces that he supports the candidate Bolsonaro and he calls on his 8 million Brazilian fans on TikTok to vote for him.
He is also not the only player from the current and past Auriverde selection to admit his preference for the far-right leader. We can cite Rivaldo, Ronaldinho, Kaka, Lucas Moura, Romario, or even Dani Alves and Cafu. Of the former glories of the Seleção, only Rai or Juninho have sided with Lula. An inclination that breaks with the image of a selection carrying the values of social progress and respect for democracy, as embodied by the late Socrates, who died in 2011. Doctor, half-brother of Raï, he was an insurrectionist who created an experiment of self-management within the Corinthians club of São Paulo to oppose the military power of the time.
The divorce is such between the current elite of Brazilian football and the popular strata that a debate is raging in the country on the possible abandonment of the iconic gold color of the Seleção. It is that at each meeting in support of Bolsonaro, his supporters parade wearing the jersey of the national team. Hence the desire of their opponents that the selection resume its original white jersey with blue facings, abandoned in 1950. Proof that the habit in Brazil can also make the monk.