The second half begins not with a whistle, but with a resumption of the beat.
In the USA media room, the air is stale. The pizza boxes on the back table are cold and untouched. The ice in the soda cups has melted into watery sludge. No one is eating. No one is drinking. Digestion requires a level of relaxation that is currently impossible.
They are witnessing a massacre.
On the screen, Brazil is not just playing football; they are dismantling the concept of defensive structure.
Minute 55.
Bolivia has abandoned any pretense of attacking. They are in survival mode. Their 5 - 4 - 1 formation has collapsed into a 9 - 1 - 0. They are a turtle retracted into its shell, praying that the birds of prey eventually get bored and fly away.
But Brazil does not get bored.
Ronaldo José receives the ball on the left touchline. The "Heir." The man wearing the Number 11 shirt that carries the weight of legends.
He is standing still. The ball is dead under his neon yellow boot. He is looking at the crowd, smiling at a fan in the front row.
"Look at him," Jackson Voss whispers, his voice thick with disbelief. "He's not even looking at the defender."
The Bolivian right back, a man named Castillo who looks like he chews gravel for breakfast, decides he has had enough. He has been humiliated for fifty five minutes. He has chased shadows. He has been nutmegged twice.
Castillo snaps.
He doesn't want the ball. He wants the ankle.
He begins his run. It is a predatory charge. He lowers his shoulder. He accelerates. He is going to do exactly what Prince did to Robin Silver in England. He is going to shear through the shin guard and snap the bone.
"He's going to kill him," Ben Cutter mutters, wincing.
Castillo launches. He leaves the ground. Two feet. Studs showing. A career ending missile.
In the hotel room, the USA players brace for the impact. They expect the scream. They expect the stretcher.
But Ronaldo José sees the future.
He doesn't flinch. He doesn't brace for impact.
He jumps.
It isn't a panic jump. It is a vertical leap of grace.
While in the air, floating above the murderous slide tackle, Ronaldo flicks the ball up with his toe.
He catches the ball on his chest mid flight.
Castillo slides underneath him, a screeching torpedo of malice that hits absolutely nothing but grass. He slides out of bounds, crashing into the advertising boards.
Ronaldo lands softly. The ball drops from his chest to his foot.
He hasn't lost momentum. He hasn't lost the rhythm.
He drives into the box.
"He... he hopped him," Andrew Smith stammers. "That's not physics."
Ronaldo is now one on one with the goalkeeper.
Any normal striker shoots here. They blast it low and hard. They ensure the goal.
Ronaldo does not shoot.
He stops.
He puts his foot on the ball right on the six yard line.
The goalkeeper, a terrified man named Lampe, rushes out. He spreads his arms. He screams. He dives at Ronaldo's feet, desperate to smother the danger.
Ronaldo waits until the keeper is fully committed. Until Lampe is lying horizontal in the air.
Flick.
Ronaldo scoops the ball. A delicate, arrogant chip.
The ball floats over the keeper's desperate fingers. It hangs in the air for an agonizing second.
It drops into the net.
GOAL.
Brazil 3 - 0 Bolivia.
Ronaldo doesn't run. He turns to the camera. He beckons his teammates.
Lucas Ribeiro runs over. Danilo Costa runs over. Even the defensive midfielder, Casemiro, jogs up.
They line up.
They dance.
It is choreographed. It is perfectly synchronized. Hips right. Hips left. Spin. Point to the sky. They are laughing. They are hugging.
In the USA hotel room, the silence is heavy enough to crush a man.
This isn't just a goal. It is a statement of total, unparalleled superiority.
It is the difference between a mechanic fixing a car and an artist painting a masterpiece. Robin Silver broke his leg trying to force a play against a brute. Ronaldo José turned the brute into a prop for his highlight reel.
"We have to play that?" Jackson Voss asks.
The question hangs in the air.
Voss is a good defender. He is solid. He is strong. He understands positioning. But watching Ronaldo float over a tackle like a ghost? Voss knows, deep down in his gut, that there is no tactical drill for that. You can't train for magic.
"How do you stop it?" Cutter asks, his voice barely a whisper. "If you tackle him, he jumps. If you stand off him, he shoots."
Nobody answers.
Minute 70.
The torture continues.
Usually, when a team is up 3 - 0, they act mercifully. They slow the game down. They conserve energy. They substitute the stars to protect them.
Brazil makes a substitution.
The board goes up.
Red: 9 (Renan Toledo)
Green: 19 (Pani Costa)
"Thank god," Adam Richards mutters. "Toledo was killing them."
Toledo is the starting striker. A beast. Removing him should be a relief.
But then Pani Costa steps onto the pitch.
He is twenty years old. He plays for Benfica. He is not a "star" yet. He is raw.
But "raw" for Brazil means something very different than "raw" for the USA.
Pani Costa doesn't jog. He vibrates. He looks like a greyhound waiting for the rabbit.
Minute 74.
Felipe Tavares, the Brazilian center back, has the ball. He looks up. He sees Pani Costa making a run on the right wing.
Tavares pings a sixty yard ball.
It is perfect. But the Bolivian left back, a veteran named Flores, has the angle. Flores is five yards ahead. He should win the race comfortably.
Pani Costa activates the jets.
It doesn't look real. It looks like the footage has been sped up.
Pani eats the five yard gap in three strides. He blows past Flores as if the Bolivian is standing still. The wind from his passing probably gave Flores a cold.
Pani reaches the ball before it goes out.
He traps it dead on the byline.
Now, he is isolated. Three Bolivian defenders are scrambling back, breathless, terrified. They form a wall.
A normal winger crosses. A normal winger recycles possession.
Pani Costa cuts inside.
He drives at the first defender. Feint left. Go right. The defender falls over.
He drives at the second. Step over. Step over. Push. The defender is left twisting in the wind.
He drives at the third.
The third defender just backs away. He is too scared to tackle. He is terrified of being the next victim on the reel.
Pani is at the edge of the box. He has dribbled through the entire Bolivian defense in six seconds.
He looks at the goal.
He blasts it.
There is no finesse this time. Just raw, unadulterated power.
The ball hits the top corner so hard that it gets stuck in the stanchion of the net.
GOAL.
Brazil 4 - 0 Bolivia.
Pani Costa screams. He runs to the corner flag, slides on his knees, and points to the name on the back of his jersey.
Remember the name.
"Jesus Christ," Elias Gordon mutters. "That's their sub? That's the guy sitting on the bench?"
The depth is terrifying.
If you stop Ronaldo, you have to deal with Ribeiro. If you stop Ribeiro, you have to deal with Ventura. If you survive them all, they bring on a kid who runs the 100 meters in ten seconds and can dribble through a minefield.
Minute 88.
Brazil scores a fifth. A team goal. Twenty passes. Every player touches the ball. It ends with a tap in for Casemiro.
5 - 0.
The referee blows the final whistle. He doesn't add stoppage time. It would be cruel. It would be a war crime.
The Brazilians hug. They wave to the crowd. They look fresh. They look like they could play another ninety minutes right now.
The screen cuts to the stats.
Brazil:
Goals: 5
xG (Expected Goals): 3.2
Shots: 24
On Target: 15
Bolivia:
Goals: 0
xG: 0.1
Shots: 1
On Target: 0
The feed cuts back to the studio analysts. They are laughing. They are running out of superlatives.
In the media room, the silence has solidified. It is a physical presence.
Andrew Smith is staring at his phone. He is scrolling through the advanced metrics app he pays a subscription for. He is shaking his head, over and over again.
"It doesn't make sense," Smith mutters.
"What doesn't?" Cutter asks numbly.
"3.2 xG," Smith says, pointing at his screen. "They scored five goals from 3.2 expected. That is a statistical anomaly. That is an overperformance of nearly two hundred percent."
Smith looks up, his eyes wide, pleading for logic to return to the world.
"It's unsustainable," Smith insists. "You can't keep scoring from impossible angles. The law of averages says they should have scored three. Maybe two."
"The law of averages doesn't apply to them, Andrew."
Johnny's voice cuts through the room.
The coach is still standing at the back. He hasn't moved for forty five minutes. He stands like a statue in the shadows.
"They aren't an anomaly," Johnny says. He walks forward, into the light of the screen. "They are the standard."
He looks at Smith.
"You are looking for math. You want to believe that if we just play our system, the numbers will save us. But football isn't math. It's art. And they are masters."
Johnny turns to face the whole room.
He sees the fear. He sees Adam Richards trembling. He sees Voss looking old.
"That," Johnny says, pointing at the frozen image of the celebrating Brazilians, "is what we are chasing. Not just the win. But the dominance. The arrogance."
"We can't play like that," Voss says quietly. "We aren't them."
"No," Johnny agrees. "We aren't."
He pauses.
"We have to be something else. We can't out dance them. We can't out skill them. If we try to play 'Joga Bonito' against Brazil, we lose 5 - 0."
Johnny's eyes harden.
"We have to be ugly. We have to be mean. We have to drag them out of the carnival and into the alley."
He looks at the door where Robin exited earlier.
"Ronaldo José plays with joy," Johnny repeats. "He jumps over tackles because he thinks the game is a celebration."
Johnny looks back at his terrified squad.
"We need to show him that the game is a funeral."
He claps his hands once. Sharp. Loud.
"Get out. Go to sleep. If you can."
The players stand up. They shuffle out of the room. They don't talk. There is no banter. There is no music.
They are thinking about Pani Costa's speed. They are thinking about Ronaldo's jump.
They are thinking about the inevitable.
Andrew Smith lingers for a moment. He looks at the screen one last time.
3.2 xG.
He closes his analytics app.
For the first time in his life, the numbers don't make him feel safe.
He walks out into the hallway.
The hotel is quiet.
But in the gym, three floors down, there is a sound.
Clang.
Clang.
Clang.
Iron hitting iron.
Robin Silver is still awake.
And he isn't looking at the stats. He is sharpening the knife.