No nation has aligned itself so closely with football. For over a century, its people, its politicians and its poets have found in the game the finest expression of the nation"s collective potential, its ethnic diversity and its rich cultures of dance and music. Since 1938, when Brazil dazzled at the World Cup in France, the entire world has seen Brazilian football as exotic and otherworldly. Very few Brazilian phrases have entered the global lingua franca like О logo Bonito - the Beautiful Game. Yet there is another side to Brazil and its game, one that reflects the harsh realities of the futebol nation, one where the game"s deep connections to the country"s social structures, economic institutions and political processes are laid bare: the grinding poverty that creates such a vast pool of hungry players; its corrupt and unaccountable institutions exemplified by its football authorities; and the pervasive violence that has seeped its way both onto the field of play and into ...