Brazil continued their brilliant World Cup qualifying campaign on Tuesday night, with a 4-0 victory away to Bolivia. They’d already qualified for the tournament in Qatar, but continued to bang the goals in, breaking their own qualification records in the process.
Aston Villa’s Philippe Coutinho started the match for Tite’s side, but was given just 5.5/10 by Globo Esporte, the lowest ranking and from one of Brazil’s major outlets.
However, that doesn’t mean he played badly, just that he was impacted more than others by the altitude.
Prior to the match, Tite had spoken negatively about having to play in La Paz. The stadium has an altitude of more than 3,600 metres and has impacted players for many years.
Globo explain Coutinho had ‘first rate touches’ during the first half, and helped to control the pace of the game. After that, the Aston Villa star ‘seemed to be hampered by the altitude’ and started to misplace passes with heavy touches. He was brought off just after half-time, due to being ‘tired’.
Aston Villa play on Saturday, away to Wolves, and Steven Gerrard will be hoping the Brazilian has fully recovered by then.
