World Cup Fever: Brazilian President More Comfortable With Soccer Than World Issues

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, June 13, 2006 — -- Few world leaders love football as much as Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

The die-hard Corinthians fan peppers his speeches with footballing analogies, plays five-a-side games with his ministers, and enjoys nothing more than discussing the games finer points with players, managers and club chairmen.

He is one of the few international statesman who is more at home debating the respective merits of 3-5-2 and 4-4-2 with Pele than discussing the war in Iraq with Tony Blair or George W. Bush.

So it was no surprise when he arranged for a live video link up with the Brazil squad from their base in Konigstein last week. And no shock that he put his foot in it. For another thing Lula is famous for is saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.

Since taking power in 2003 Lula has called foreign dignitaries by their wrong names, unwittingly accused the US of serial selfishness and once told Namibians he couldn't believe he was in Africa because their country was so clean.

Last week he caused a furor by asking Brazil manager Carlos Alberto Parreira if Ronaldo really was fat.

"I meet up with Ronaldo now and then and I know he's thin," Lula said to Parreira during the conference call. "But every so often we read in the Brazilian press that Ronaldo is fat. So, is he fat or isn't he fat?"

"He's very strong, president," a characteristically diplomatic Parreira responded, before adding that Ronaldo was no longer the skinny kid he called up as a reserve for the 1994 World Cup.

The Brazilian players were under strict orders not to ask Lula any questions or enter into any discussions with him and so Ronaldo's ire only became apparent the next day. In conversations with reporters after training, the obviously irritated star, said, "Everyone says he [Lula] drinks all the time. Just as it's a lie that I am fat, it must be a lie that he drinks too much."

Two years ago, the New York Times published a story acusing Lula of overdoing the cachaca, the potent cane spirit that is Brazil's most popular drink (and the main ingredient of the caipirinha).