THE fact that Brazil didn’t quite manage to purge the World Cup demons that have haunted them for four long years against Switzerland in their opening game may not bode well for Costa Rica when the nations meet this afternoon in the Saint Petersburg Stadium.

The swaggering style of o jogo bonito displayed in the opening 25 minutes against the Swiss hinted that the cathartic release this nation has been craving since that almighty humbling at the hands of Germany on home soil would be delivered, but some appalling defending and stoic resistance from their opponents meant that the game ended amid a ripple of indifferent applause rather than with a primal scream.

Not only will the samba stars be looking to unleash that pent-up fury on their fellow South Americans, but given that they allowed themselves to spill two points in that opening fixture, a victory in this match – while not essential in their pursuit of qualification just yet – suddenly takes on far greater importance.

They will be buoyed by the news that their main man Neymar trained yesterday after missing the two sessions immediately following their opening fixture with an ankle knock, allowing coach Tite to name an unchanged side (although curiously, Thiago Silva will captain the side after Marcelo was skipper against Switzerland). Their talisman can expect to come in for the same rough treatment against the Costa Ricans as he did to such brutal effect on Sunday against Switzerland, despite the protestations to the contrary yesterday from Costa Rica coach Oscar Ramirez. He did admit though he will deploy two men to mark the world’s most expensive footballer.

The conundrum that faces their coach Tite this lunchtime isn’t all that dissimilar to the one that faced him in their first outing, with Costa Rica expected to approach the match with a tightly-packed defensive unit that will hope to stymie Brazil before hitting on the counter when their opponents over-commit, as the likes of Marcelo and Danilo are wont to do from their nominal full-back stations.

It was suggested to Tite by the Brazilian media that by being so reliant on Neymar, his side would make it easier for the Costa Ricans to snuff out any danger, but yesterday he refuted suggestions that he had felt the need to pull his star man aside and order him to buy more into the team ethic.

“Absolutely not,” Tite said. “The information you got is not true, it’s not true. It didn’t happen.

“All the players have the responsibility of playing for the collective and also being individuals, some with some specific characteristics.

“Neymar, I’m not going to take away from him this initiative in the last third of the pitch. He’s a genius. You have my word, this is not true.

“We all have to work as a team, but we have to respect the characteristics. In the last third of the pitch, you have to create possibilities for the finish. I’m not going to take that away from anybody.”

Brazil, of course, will go into the encounter as heavy favourites to get the three points, but Costa Rica are far from the no-hopers they were painted to be when they shocked Scotland back in 1990.

If they are to have any chance at all, they will have to show far more of a cutting edge than they did as they were edged out by a brilliant Alexander Kolarov free-kick in their opening game against Serbia. They missed one golden opportunity before falling behind but showed little by way of a response once Serbia hit the front.

Still, it shouldn’t be forgotten that Costa Rica stormed to the quarter-finals of the last World Cup in Brazil, and if they can keep things tight at the back, they know that they will likely get chances at the other end with their opponents conceding in six straight matches now at the tournament.

That being said, anything other than a relatively straight-forward win for the Brazilians would be a seismic shock, and with the wounds of Belo Horizonte in 2014 still raw, you can’t see them allowing that to happen.