The Brazilian team always enters each World Cup with the hope of winning the championship. However, this time, the belief in Selecao largely comes from the reputation and quality of stars rather than a long-term and stable preparation process.
Since 2023, the Brazilian national team has gone through four different coaches and has 84 players used at least once. After a series of directional changes, Carlo Ancelotti was finally chosen to lead the national team at the 2026 World Cup after officially taking office in June 2025.
That means that the Italian strategist only has 4 official matches in the South American World Cup qualifiers to work with the team, of which 2 matches take place when Brazil has secured a ticket to North America. Therefore, most of his preparation process has been carried out through 7 friendly matches since the qualifiers closed.
Ancelotti often prioritizes an attacking system with two central midfielders and 4 highest-playing players. Casemiro (10 matches), Bruno Guimaraes (9 matches) and Vinicius Junior (9 matches) are the players who have played the most under this coach. The 4-2-4 formation also reflects the fact that Brazil possesses many quality attacking factors but does not have many options in midfield.
While the central midfield pair is almost defined, the four positions in the attack are still a wide open competition. Especially after Rodrygo - Brazil's number one scorer since 2023 with 8 goals - and Estevao - the player with the most goals under Ancelotti with 5 goals - had injury problems.
Vinicius and Raphinha are the most outstanding stars remaining, but their influence in the national team is not really commensurate with what they have shown at the club level.
Vinicius has directly participated in 183 goals in 257 matches for Real Madrid in the last 5 seasons, achieving an efficiency of 0.79 goals or assists per game. However, in the Brazilian shirt, that number is only 17 times contributing to goals after 48 matches, equivalent to 0.36 times per game.
A similar situation also happened to Raphinha. The Barcelona star has participated in 127 goals in 177 matches for the club, achieving an efficiency of 0.72 times per match, but only contributed 18 goals in 38 matches for the Brazilian national team.
Due to not having a true center forward strong enough to make a difference, in addition to Igor Thiago of Brentford who was not expected to start, Vinicius or Raphinha could be pushed into the role of center forward. Under Ancelotti, Vinicius spent 57% of his playing time in the striker position, while Raphinha had up to 43% of his time working as a central attacking midfielder.
The remaining positions in the attack line will be a competition between Matheus Cunha, Luiz Henrique, Rayan, Gabriel Martinelli, Endrick, Igor Thiago and especially Neymar - the name that was unexpectedly called back.
Among them, Cunha is the most promising candidate. He created 11 scoring chances under Ancelotti, only behind Vinicius (18), Bruno Guimaraes (15) and Casemiro (14), although playing significantly less.
Luiz Henrique, Rayan and Endrick are also factors expected by Brazilian fans. Luiz Henrique performed 14 successful dribbles after only 344 minutes of play, almost equal to Vinicius's 18 dribbles in 685 minutes.
Meanwhile, Rayan and Endrick both scored for the Brazilian team on special stages. The Bournemouth striker scored in his second appearance at the Maracana, while Endrick scored in his third match against England at Wembley.
However, the name that creates the most attention is still Neymar. The player who scored the most goals in Brazil's history in official matches with 79 goals has not worn the national team jersey since October 2023. After returning to Santos in 2025, he showed enough ability to convince Ancelotti to give him a chance at the World Cup.
