Alisson Says Brazil Goalkeeper Pressure Tops President Ahead of World Cup
Brazil goalkeeper Alisson Becker said Carlo Ancelotti faces more pressure than the president of Brazil as the team prepares for the World Cup. Brazil opens against Morocco on Saturday night with expectations tied to a sixth title and a run of results that has not delivered one since 2002.
Alisson Becker On Ancelotti
“His position perhaps has more pressure than being the president of the country,” Alisson said in East Rutherford, N.J., about the coach. That is the kind of job Brazil has handed Ancelotti: guide a squad that is judged not against ordinary tournament standards, but against the country’s own history at the top of the sport.
Brazil has won 17 of its 20 World Cup openers since 1934 and has been unbeaten in those openers since that same year. The opener against Morocco carries that record into a match against a team ranked seventh in the world, one spot behind Brazil.
Brazil And Morocco In East Rutherford
Morocco enters after winning its continent’s title in January 2026 in controversial fashion, after Senegal was awarded a 3-0 forfeit victory. Ancelotti described Morocco as a side that belongs in the same conversation as the game’s biggest names, saying, “In modern football, there is no — how we say? — small-time team,” and adding, “They are definitely up to the task.”
The matchup also carries a clean past result. Brazil beat Morocco 3-0 in their only World Cup meeting, in the 1998 group stage, but that was before the current pressure point around this team had grown so severe.
Brazil’s Title Drought
Vinícius Júnior put the broader stakes in direct terms on Friday through an interpreter: “We’re here to try to change history, try to put Brazil back to where it never should have left, which is at the top.” He also said, “We are at the same level as the other major teams.”
That framing fits Brazil’s recent record. The team has not won the World Cup since 2002, and it has reached the quarterfinals only once since then. The low point in that stretch remains the 7-1 loss to Germany in the 2014 World Cup semifinals in Belo Horizonte, a result that still hangs over every conversation about where Brazil stands now.
The opening against Morocco gives Brazil a first chance to push past that history rather than talk around it. With the team ranked sixth in the world and trying to chase a record sixth World Cup title, the response begins with one game and one result.
