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Adrieli Berte, Lediane Marcolan, Ana Carolina Sestari and Gaby Vanelli were born in silent cities in Brazil’s south. They live 10,000 kilometres away in the rambunctious Italian capital. They are firm friends, team-mates, accustomed to defending a crest decorated by Romulus, Remus and the Capitoline Wolf together in their beloved five-on-five sport.
On this occasion, however, they were in different colours in a three-versus-one battle. Tampa, as Lediane is better known, was in the canary-yellow of Brazil. Berte, Sestari and Vanelli were in Italy jerseys.
They were tuning into the draw for the first FIFA Futsal Women’s World Cup™. What happened next was, as Sestari put it, “inevitable”. Brazil and Italy, despite having never met in a women’s futsal international, were grouped together.
FIFA caught up with Sestari to discuss the seismic fixture, banter with Tampa, where she ranks among the planet’s best goalkeepers, her amazing ability on the ball and the Azzurre’s quest to lift the trophy.
Ana Carolina Sestari: I think there are a lot of good goalkeepers. I think there are a lot of more complete goalkeepers than me, so I don’t believe I did. Obviously I really wanted to win. That’s what we work for. It’s an important award, but I believe that whoever won deserved it. I hope I get there one day. I really hope it happens. But for now, just being in the top 10 is rewarding to me.
I believe it’s between the two: Bianca Castagnaro and Ana Catarina [Pereira]. I believe Bianca is the most complete goalkeeper. I look up to her a lot because she’s so good with the ball at her feet, it really improves her as a goalkeeper. Ana Catarina is also an excellent goalkeeper. I believe they’re the two best, and I’d put myself in the mix. I’m up there competing with them.
I’ve scored more goals in the last two years than I had in previous years. I scored 15 two years ago and nine last year. I almost made the top scorers’ list. I recently moved teams to play more with my feet. That was a goal of mine. Previously I played much more as a goalkeeper who stayed on her line. It wasn’t working out for me. My current team plays much more offensively, has a coach who wants to play this way. Today I focus more on ball possession and creating numerical superiority. I’m always looking to improve, to reach the level of the best, to become the best. Goalkeepers now have to be more complete, have to play more with their feet.
I think Italy’s evolution happened really quickly. We’re a very young team. In 10 years, look at what we’ve achieved. I believe lots of foreign players joining the Italian league helped the Italian players a lot. It also gave Italian futsal a lot of idols. But I still think there is a lot of room to improve. We’re not just trying to grow as a national team, we’re trying to grow the professionalism of the league, because this will make a difference to the national team in the future. That’s why we’re very much inspired by Portugal and Spain.
I think it’s going to be a very exciting match. Obviously we know the Brazilian girls very well. Almost all of them have played here in Italy. It will be very good for us to see what level we’re at, because Brazil are one of the best national teams in the world. We’ll find out early on. So I liked the draw. They say it’s the group of death, and that’s fine. We’re ready to get out of the group of death.
We watched the draw together (laughs). There was the Italian national players from Roma and her. We were in our Italy shirts and she was in her Brazil shirt! It was really funny. Tampa’s my friend, I have other friends in the Brazil squad. I can’t wait to face them. Everyone will be all out to win. We can’t deny that. They have excellent players, but I think they know that we also have excellent players.
She always scores the most beautiful goals past me! This year, being on her side is very important. She is very important for Brazil. We know what quality she has. She is one of the best players out there.
Renatinha is one of the best in the world. It’s great that she plays for us. It’s great that she makes a difference for us. In terms of ability, she’s one of the best in the world if not the best. She’s really important for our national team. She’s also really important for the atmosphere in the squad. As well as being an outstanding player, she’s a really good laugh, she tells a lot of jokes.
To win. We’re going there to win the title. I believe the four main contenders are Brazil, Spain, Portugal and Italy. Slightly behind them come Argentina, Japan, Colombia. It’s going to be a very wide-open championship. But I think the first four are on a slightly higher level than the rest.
