85 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Remo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Remo can pretend not to have heard.
The deal with Avaí is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Argentinos Juniors will make the call about Leonel Picco this week. Remo have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Leonel Picco was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Patrick de Paula 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.
A club from his own country has asked the question, and he has never pretended he did not want to be asked. Remo have a conversation ahead of them that they will not win with money.
116 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Remo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 The request is on a desk at Remo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Léo Lang was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Remo can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Renato Batista after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
Leonel Picco 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.
Patrick de Paula 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.
A 1‑0 win over Athletico Paranaense, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Something was said to Carlos Júnior and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Squad9 Nov 2026
9 new faces, and Remo are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager’s verdict
SquadJoão Almeida is the weekend's best young player
Patrick de Paula 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 20 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jaderson 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 board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Marcelo is living that version at Remo, and it tends to show in the first month.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Remo can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Leonel Picco 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.
It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 34 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Léo Lang 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Remo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jaderson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
25 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jaderson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Minute 90, against Paysandu, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
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 Patrick de Paula is on it.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Matheus Frizzo wants continental football; whether Remo can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Leonel Picco was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Patrick de Paula 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.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.99 on the card, and the Remo support went home talking about one name.
Squad14 Sep 2026
24 new faces, and Remo are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Successful dribbles: 15. 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.
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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Renato Batista on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
In brief
The dugoutPedro Rocha has become a man the manager trusts