India, July 10 -- Football is the world's most-loved sport, yet it once belonged, if it can be said to belong to anyone, to one country. Brazil was football, and football was Brazil.

That was where the game went to find its soul, its fountain of creativity; its artists and soldiers, gods, priests and troubadours. Barefoot and in nothing but tattered shorts, playing with a ball made from scraps of cloth tied together, or dazzling the world in cobalt blue and canary yellow, it was all the same.

"The ball is my best friend," said Pele.

"I learned all about life with a ball at my feet," said Ronaldinho.

This is a country where a newborn's parents hang the shirt of the team they support on the door of their baby's room. And where people, w...