Amidst chaos, ‘Brazilian Pep Guardiola’ Fernando Diniz sparkles hopes of a revolution with Selecao

Fernando Diniz, the interim Brazilian coach, gets emotional when he talks about 1982. It’s the year he lost his father; it was also the year he fell in love with football. “It helped us (he and his brothers) forget the pain,” he would say in an interview with Globo.

The ebullience of what the world calls the greatest team to have never won a World Cup would leave a lasting impression on young Diniz. “Although they didn’t win, they captivated many hearts and I was one of them.”

Young Fernando and his brothers would paint the streets in canary yellow. drew the players on the walls, and tuned into every game on the radio. “The team awakened almost a certainty that they would win the title, so there was a lot of crying when they lost. But life is more art than science. Football has the power to move people and change lives,” he would say.

All he dreamt was to wear the Canary Yellow robes. He never realized his dream, the midfielder’s career was spent shuttling through 14 different clubs. So seemed his managerial journey, until he guided Fluminense to the league title before wrapping the season winning the Copa Libertadores the season past. But it was not so much of his success as his playing that fetched him the manager job with the national team.

It could be that he is just an interim coach before Carlo Ancelotti takes over after his contract with Real Madrid expires. It could be that he could be axed if Brazil continues their losing streak (they have lost three on the spin, all to bitter rivals Argentina, Colombia and Uruguay), but Diniz, unfazed by the mounting challenges and criticisms, is on a single-minded mission to bring ‘joy back to the way we play.’

“You are the heroes of many people, the face of a country. So