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Argentines Sing of Brazil’s Humiliation, Loudly and in Rio

As the Brazil team has come spectacularly undone in the World Cup, the pain for the host country has been compounded by the prospect that its hated rival, Argentina, could still lift the championship trophy on Sunday in Rio de Janeiro’s fabled Estádio do Maracanã, after Argentina won a tense semifinal against the Netherlands in a penalty shootout on Wednesday afternoon.

The tens of thousands of Argentine fans who have invaded Brazil to cheer for their team, and taunt their hosts, brought with them a song — set to the tune of “Bad Moon Rising” by Creedence Clearwater Revival — that predicts not just triumph for Argentina, but deep humiliation for Brazil. And the players themselves have joined the choir.

The song, “Brasil, Decime Qué Se Siente,” or, “Brazil, Tell Me How It Feels,” asks the Brazilians how they like being bossed around in their own house and suggests that Lionel Messi is about to follow in the footsteps of Diego Maradona by returning the World Cup to Argentina.

The lyrics include a dig about a famous goal scored against Brazil by Argentina’s Claudio Caniggia in the 1990 World Cup, and the song concludes with what my colleague David Waldstein called “the most incendiary statement of all: ‘Maradona es más grande que Pelé.'”

“The dream for any Aregentinian football lover is to win the World Cup in Brazil. It’s the only dream,” the journalist Leandro Illia told BBC News in a report broadcast on Wednesday. The countries, he added, otherwise have good relations, “but in soccer they hate each other.”

Video clips of exuberant, bouncing Argentine fans singing the song — in the stands, on the beaches and in the streets of Brazil — have spread online as the tournament has progressed.

Players for the national team joined in, offering a spirited rendition last month near their training camp in Belo Horizonte, and a second, more raucous one during their locker room celebrations after they defeated Belgium to advance to the semifinal.

As the Argentine journalist Lisandro Guzmán reported, the song is similar to one that was previously sung by supporters of the Buenos Aires club San Lorenzo de Almagro, a.k.a. Pope Francis’ team.

Last year, a version with reworked lyrics was used by fans of another Buenos Aires club, Boca Juniors, to taunt their crosstown rival, River Plate.

The latest rendition of the song has also been sung back in Argentina, in homes, on the streets and on the air.

Perhaps the most inspired version, though, is a YouTube remix produced by a video blogger who added the new words to old footage of Creedence Clearwater Revival performing the original.

While Argentine fans are approaching peak schadenfreude — as evidenced Wednesday night by some fans singing a new version of the song that asked Brazilians how it feels to give up 7 goals — Brazil could still have the last laugh.

For the song’s prophecy to come true, the Argentines will now have to find some way to avoid being humbled themselves by a powerful German team in the final. And, according to the Brazilian journalist Fernando Duarte, they can expect to find the entire host nation rooting against them when they take the field on Sunday.

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