Corinthians Needs Some Good PR – Stat.

By: chris | June 9th, 2009

Ronaldo couldn’t save them. But then again, not even Ronaldo in his prime could save them.

Corinthians, you might remember, spent the winter courting then-chunky Ronaldo for their return to the Brazilian top flight after a relatively humiliating one-season plummet to the depths of “B”. That was good PR. Very good PR. Especially when they got him. They finally had a face – no, The Face – to drive their return. It started out when, including a Sao Paulo state championship, and Ronaldo’s been stellar. But since that championship, it’s been all downhill in rapid fashion.

Making big news during that state championship celebration wasn’t their win – they’ve got plenty of those in the bag already – but rather their catastrophic victory celebration when one of the geniuses running the show set the confetti to go off near the fireworks. Something which probably wasn’t entirely their fault, but did occur at their home stadium, which means they had a hand in the preparations. Fortunately no one was hurt, but it was caught on YouTube and thus a moment was born. Strike one.

Last week it took a legitimately tragic turn when a Corinthians fan died during violence/riots amidst a Copa do Brasil game against Vasco da Gama. The fan was reportedly beaten to death by Vasco supporters – once again, not their fault – but Corinthians fans retaliated by setting a bus of Vasco supporters on fire (0:50). An eye for an eye is bad enough. An eye for a bus full? That’s well more than excessive. (No reports of injuries from that blaze that I can find, which is good.)

[Dirty Tackle]

And yesterday Corinthians took another tumble which will require a PR crisis meeting. At the U-18 World Championships yesterday, their youngsters were booted from the tournament via a 3-0 loss to Real Madrid. Upon the little Blancos scoring the third goal, the Corinthians kids took exception to having no defense and proceeded to go all Enter The Dragon on them. But best yet is when the Real Madrid keeper comes in and tries to defuse the situation, the Corinthians keeper shows his class and plants a left hook upside the Spaniard’s head.

[101 Great Goals]

One gets the feeling this isn’t the storybook return for which they were hoping. Maybe next winter they should go after a public relations guru instead?