“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Botafogo have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Dodo and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad26 Feb 2029
Words at Botafogo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artur is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nobody at Botafogo will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Allan trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Two hours a week with a tutor, which is the least glamorous thing at Botafogo and the one that decides whether a foreign signing is still here in two years.
Dodo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vitinho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Arthur Cabral trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Botafogo know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
20 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Botafogo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Instituto had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
The offer from Adana Demirspor for Kayke was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Botafogo hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Dodo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Words at Botafogo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vitinho is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
108 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Botafogo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 8.81 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Botafogo can pretend not to have heard.
Dodo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
17 goals in 23 games at Deportivo Maldonado — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Botafogo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Words at Botafogo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artur is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The words a physio says slowly. 117 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Nautico waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Botafogo is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
1 for Dodo, marked 7.90, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
The offer from Bahia for Lucas Monzón was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Botafogo, and it is not being withdrawn.
The first defeat in 9 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Corinthians; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botafogo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botafogo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
At 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Botafogo will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Botafogo, and 6 appearances in 30 say he has earned the hearing.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
The offer from Fluminense for Álvaro Montoro was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Botafogo people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Successful dribbles: 28. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botafogo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Botafogo have gone to Santos with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Botafogo asked and Fluminense said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Botafogo they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Jonathan Calleri was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
At 23 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vitinho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A goalkeeper's career is counted in the games nobody scored in, and Gabriel Batista now has 25 of them across 205 appearances. Nothing about that number was luck.
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Ismaily
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Botafogo they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botafogo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Allan commits to Botafogo for another 2 years.
Squad8 May 2028
Words at Botafogo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artur is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
5 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Botafogo, another week without a signature from Ismaily.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Botafogo have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Botafogo is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Dodo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Botafogo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artur is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Fortaleza will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Reverson has pre-agreed a move to Botafogo, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Botafogo know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Botafogo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Botafogo is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Giuliano has agreed terms with Bragantino for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
At 23 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Words at Botafogo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artur is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Botafogo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nobody at Botafogo will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
6 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
36 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
Two goals and a mark of 9.80 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 9.59 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Botafogo will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Botafogo they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Botafogo and Palmeiras in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Júnior Santos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.