GLOBAL FOOTBALL


CHILE


FOOTBALL FRIENDS AROUND THE WORLD:


A


few months ago 33 men emerged one-by-one from a mine in Chile


relatively unscathed, having survived underground for six long and lonely weeks. As one man escaped, his fi rst thought was to unfurl a banner of his beloved Colo Colo, the top club in Chilean football. Another miner fetched himself a ball and proceeded to do some keepy- uppies, proving that 40 days in darkness hadn’t dampened his feel for a football. Most fans will probably


FOOTBALL FRIENDS ISSUE 2


remember the outrageously patriotic Ivan Zamorano and his strike partner Marcelo Salas tearing defences apart at World Cup 98 on their way to a fi nal 16 place before their elimination by Brazil. Yet a look back at their country’s history shows a number of decent World Cup performances, especially for one with a population about a quarter the size of England’s. Chile even played in the inaugural World Cup tournament in Uruguay in


1930, and fi nished third in 1962 when they actually hosted the competition. Yet after this brief foray into


the tournament’s latter stages there seems to have been a decline. A series of fi rst round exits or failings to qualify were only broken by their good performance in 1998, with this relative success attributed to two outstanding players rather than a massive improvement in their national game. Cast an eye back to this summer’s World Cup though, where Chile


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