European "Little Devils" Belgium is yearning to make some trouble for Brazil, while acknowledging that their second game in the group is more important.
"Everybody is ready to play and we hope to make good results during the Olympic Games," said coach Jean Francois De Sart. "But we know we are drawn in a strong group, with one of the favorites of the tournament Brazil, but we can make problem for every team."
The Belgian tactics will be more of counter-attack when facing Brazil's sharp offensiveness. "We are going to set up strong defense, as there are a lot of good players in the Brazilian squad,"
However, the coach said the second match is more important to advance to the next round, which will be against China on August 10.
Belgium peaked early as far as the men's Olympic football tournament is concerned. Winners of the title on home soil in 1920, the Red Devils last appeared at the competition in 1928. Jean-Francois De Sart's crew ended this 80-year drought by qualifying for Beijing 2008.
Even though they are less known in international arena, the Belgian do have some world-class players such as Vincent Kompany who plays in the midfield for the German club Hamburger SV.
The Brazilian's luxury roster features maestros such as midfielder Diego of Werder Bremen, attacker Alexandre Pato of AC Milan, and two-time World Player of the Year Ronaldinho, who recently transferred from Barcelona to AC Milan.
Brazil have won the FIFA World Cup a record five times but have come up short at the Olympics, finishing with a silver medal in the 1984 and 1988 Games, and bronze in 1996. After failing to qualify for the 2004 Athens Games, coach Dunga's side is determined to bring it home in Beijing.
"We are concentrating on our first game with Belgium. Because we have Ronaldinho the team is no difference with the national team," said Dunga.
"The only problem is we only have 15 days to prepare the Olympics. Diego will not play the first game."
The team just finished warm-up with Vietnam in which they posted a 2-0 win. In an earlier tune-up match, they beat Singapore 3-0.
But Dunga did not see any easy game in the tournament. "Every team playing brazil they tend to be defensive and play counter-attack, and like last game with Vietnam it was a tough game."
"My generation has won champions in World Cup and Copa America but not the Olympics. With the new generation we'd like to win the Olympics," said Dunga, who helped Brazil win 1989 Copa America and 1994 World Cup, as well as a silver medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.
Brazil is grouped with host China, Belgium and New Zealand. It would be a manageable task to reach the knockout stage as the top of the group.
(Xinhua News Agency August 6, 2008)