“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Boardroom19 Apr 2027
2 academy players handed senior numbers at Botafogo
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
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 no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Vitor Pereira has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Eduardo Gomes has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
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 Alex Telles is on it.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Jhonatan
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Pablo
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cristian Medina was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Bastos 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.
“I watch every Botafogo game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Athletic Club runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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 Cristian Medina is on it.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Botafogo. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
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 0 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cristian Medina was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Vitor Freitas has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Wesley Barbosa has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. José Monteiro has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Bruno Moreira has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
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 Jhonatan trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Botafogo heard it as anything else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cristian Medina was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 19 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. Botafogo will try not to make too much of it.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Álvaro Montoro is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
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 Matheus Martins is on it.
Kauan 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 Gian Franco Cabezas was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Eduardo Correia after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Oluwasegun Otusanya’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Athletic Club needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nobody at Athletic Club is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
It is a strip of cloth and it decides nothing on a Saturday. It still tells the dressing room exactly whose opinion the manager values, which is the whole point of it.