10 Reputations On The Line At World Cup 2014

7. Big Phil Scolari

Sticking with Brazil and in a very similar vein to captain Thiago Silva is current manager and 2002 World Cup winning boss Luiz Felipe Scolari. Hand selected by the Brazilian Football Confederation just prior to the Confederations Cup last year to be the man charged with the task of bringing the World Cup €œhome€ to Brazil and replicating his achievement of 2002, Scolari finds himself with more pressure on his shoulders than any other one man in Brazil, sans maybe Neymar. Brazil are hosting their second World Cup in history and, whilst record 5-time winners, the memories of the first time they hosted the tournament back in 1950 are still very much alive in every fan (and player's) minds. Dubbed the €œMaracanazo€, Brazil were famously defeated by Uruguay in the final match of World Cup 1950, after dominating the rest of the tournament. Parades had been scheduled, medals made and songs written for the Brazilian team BEFORE the match even began. It was seen as ceremonial. When Uruguay won, FIFA had no presentation ceremony take place because they hadn't bothered to write the award speech in Spanish, only Portuguese. The following day, some fans actually committed suicide in their misery of losing and all the newspapers bore front-page news of Brazil's defeat as if they'd been invaded and conquered by the Nazis. This is the type of pressure Scolari is under to make sure such a thing doesn't happen again. Whilst the reaction of the modern day crowd and press wont be nearly as melodramatic, if indeed Brazil do not go on to win this World Cup, the moment they are defeated will send shock-waves through the country... and baring a Zidane like incident from one of the players, the blame will fall squarely on Big Phil. Best of luck to him, is all I can say.