The coach of the Brazilian national team, Fernando Diniz, was fired on Friday, a source within the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Diniz was appointed in July 2023, but the Seleçao’s poor results cost him his place.
Brazil has only won two of the six matches it has played since the start of South American qualifying for the 2026 World Cup, which will take place in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
A year after the elimination in the quarter-finals of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar by Croatia, the “canarinha” is only sixth out of ten in the qualifying rankings, with only two points ahead of the play-off place. Worrying underperformance for the only nation to have participated in 22 editions of the World Cup, with five titles, a record.
After the departure of Tite (2016-2022), great expectations surrounded Diniz, a supporter of virtuoso and offensive football.
The 49-year-old Brazilian was appointed for one year, while being coach of the Rio club Fluminense, which won the Copa Libertadores at the end of 2023.
His mandate looked like interim while waiting for Carlo Ancelotti, whose arrival was eagerly awaited even if the Italian coach was careful not to confirm it. “Il mister” ended up cutting it short, extending his contract with Real Madrid at the end of December until June 2026.
The dismissal of Diniz comes the day after a twist in the other crisis, this one institutional, which is shaking Brazilian football: the president of the CBF Ednaldo Rodrigues, dismissed in early December by a court in Rio, was restored to his position. functions by decision of a judge of the Supreme Court.
The decision of the Carioca court had invalidated a previous agreement between the CBF and the Rio prosecutor’s office, dating from March 2022, which had allowed the election of the first black president of the federation.
But Fifa and the South American Football Confederation (Conmebol) did not view this court decision favorably, refusing any state interference in the affairs of the CBF.