The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Romarinho falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Something was said to Braian Cufré and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Paulo Bezerra after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
In brief
The dugoutMarcinho has become a man the manager trusts
Yuri Tanque and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at Criciúma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Romarinho 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.
Something was said to Waguininho and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Aírton is on it.
Goiás next, and one man in the Criciúma dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 22 actions, 7.42, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.04 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Paulo Bezerra to a room that had heard them before.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Criciúma told Cauê something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Botafogo-SP in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Operário Ferroviário will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Criciúma were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Jean Irmer scored, was marked 7.80, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Fabricio has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Criciúma they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Ronald was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.29. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.