Welcome back. Of course, let me start with the most important news of the week: Spain won the World Cup. Surprised? Well, you shouldn't be, because bad punditry aside (and there was plenty of it) it was the logical conclusion.
Football is a team sport, and that's something the Spanish have mastered, because it's a system, a school of thought, that defines the game, not a star player. The coach can swap midfielders, you won't notice it on the pitch because the structure remains: dominate passes, own the ball and ultimately score.
There was something of poetic justice to it too, and I can only point you to Brazilian newscaster Bruno Cantarelli, who captured the winning goal scored by Barcelona striker Ferran Torres with the most memorable analysis of the final.
O futebol vence a catimba - he shouted at the top of his lungs.
What does it mean? It's difficult to describe because it's a vibe, and Brazilian Portuguese is brilliant at capturing that. Sometimes you have to drop the literal translation and follow the melody of the words instead. But if I had to give a very broad description, it's the idea that football – with a capital F, o jogo bonito, the beautiful game – triumphed over catimba: the provocation, the cheating, and the lying. In other words, Spain represented football in its purest form; Argentina represented a catimba. I know that's going to get me some hate mail.
