Alisson is the complete package in goal for Brazil

As a soccer nation, Brazil haven’t always been known for goalkeepers. It’s not that there haven’t been some brilliant ones for the Seleção over the years, legends like Rogério Ceni and Cláudio Taffarel, but the squad has always been built first in the service of one generation after another of legendary attackers. Joga bonito.

Over the past decade, though, there’s a case goalkeeper has been their strongest position, with two of the best in the world available for selection. Long-serving Liverpool star Alisson and treble-winning Ederson fought for minutes with their national team while battling each season in the Premier League. With Ederson taking a step down by moving to Turkish side Fenerbahçe, it’s now Alisson’s job to lose.

By any measure, Alisson is elite. Following Liverpool’s 2019 Champions League triumph, the 33-year-old swept the goalkeeping awards and finished seventh in voting for the Ballon d’Or, an award only won once by a goalkeeper—and only four other times by defenders since first being awarded in 1956.

Alisson also backstopped Brazil to 2019 Copa America glory, their only major trophy since winning the Korea-Japan 2002 World Cup, and he won the Premier League twice with Liverpool in 2019-20 and 2024-25. The question has never been if Alisson is one of the best, it’s where he slots in the pecking order.

A goalkeeper’s first job is to stop shots. There are few in the game better than Alisson, with the player typically in the discussion just after Italy’s Gianluigi Donnarumma and Belgium’s Thibaut Courtois.

A goalkeeper’s second job is to be a commanding presence in the penalty area, both physically and in his ability to help marshal the defense. Again, there are few better than Alisson at doing that, or when it comes to fighting through traffic on corners to collect crosses.

In the modern game, there is great importance placed on being good on the ball. To be able to play with it at his feet even when put under pressure; to be able to distribute it down pitch and start counter-attacks. Spoiler: Alisson’s one of the very best in the world on that front, too.

Few would rank Alisson as the absolute best in any category, but being as good at everything as he is isn’t normal and makes him key for club and country. However, over the years Alisson has proven quite injury prone. Fitness is his one weakness. He regularly misses time each year with various injuries, including much of the end of 2025-26 with a hamstring strain.

Brazil are a soccer superpower, but they’re in the midst of the longest run of frustration and futility in their history. Following the World Cup in 2002, they’ve failed to reach the final in five tournaments since. In four, they’ve been knocked out at the quarterfinal stage.

Their best finish, fourth in 2014, came with the World Cup in Brazil—and saw them infamously demolished by Germany in the semifinal. That 7-1 defeat is widely considered one of the most embarrassing in history given the stage and Brazil’s stature. There was that 2019 Copa America, with Alisson earning the Golden Glove as top goalkeeper, but it’s been a lean millennium.

If he can stay fit now, Brazil won’t have to worry about one very important position. Alisson could be pivotal in helping them to their best result since 2002. The bigger questions for Brazil are at the other end of the pitch and whether this generation of attackers can deliver.

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