Match made in heaven? Why Taylor Swift is a Brazilian football team’s unofficial mascot
Name: The Taylor Swift Rule.
Age: 14.
Appearance: Like hundreds of thousands of screaming Brazilians.
Oh no, she is not culturally appropriating again, is she? Fortunately not. You will be pleased to hear that Taylor Swift is not directly involved with the Taylor Swift Rule.
Then who is? The Brazilian football club Corinthians.
In what sense? Swift has become an unofficial mascot for the team.
Like Kingsley, Partick Thistle’s hideous scowling sun mascot? No. Once again, you will be pleased to hear that at no point does anyone run on to the pitch and leap around wearing a massive Taylor Swift head.
Then what is it? Corinthians never lose when Swift releases an album.
Really? Really. The streak stretches all the way back to 2006, when Corinthians won the matches directly before and after the release of the eponymous Taylor Swift debut album. This lucky streak has continued for all nine of her album releases. The team have never been defeated immediately before or after one of her albums drops.
That is a lot of wins. Now, there is a difference between “always winning” and “never losing”. The releases of 1989 and Lover were relatively tough for the club, with all four matches either side of these ending in draws.
And Evermore, her latest? Not a bad result by any means. Before the album was released, they had a 0-0 draw with Fortaleza; after it, they beat São Paulo by a single goal.
Weird that anyone would notice this. Do Corinthians usually lose all the matches that take place outside a Swift album release window? On the contrary, they are actually quite good. Since Swift started releasing music, they have won Serie A three times, the Campeonato Paulista five times, the Copa do Brasil, the Copa Libertadores, the Recopa Sudamericana and the Fifa Club World Cup.
So it would be easy to invent other new coincidences? So easy. For example, in roughly the same period, Corinthians have failed to win any match that took place directly after the release of a Paul McCartney solo album.
Which makes McCartney … That’s right, a cursed figure in the world of south-east Brazilian football. By rights, they should start booing him whenever he even thinks about releasing new music.
But not Swift. No. Swift is beloved. Online football supporters don’t Photoshop kits on to just anybody, you know.
Has Swift commented on this? No. But this is Swift, remember, so there is a good chance that her fans will hysterically over-read an oblique lyric about it on the internet at some point soon.
Do say: “Corinthians win every time Taylor Swift releases an album.”
Don’t say: “But they did lose right before she appeared in Cats.”