Maricá will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Nova Iguaçu were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Player ratings19 Jul 2027
A brace, and Ruan Ribeiro takes the afternoon — 9.17
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ruan Ribeiro provided it, and the 9.17 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 The request is on a desk at Nova Iguaçu, and it is not being withdrawn.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Xandinho 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.
At 23 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.
Position 3, 29 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Raul 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Luan Capanni was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Nova Iguaçu know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Léo Rafael was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Nova Iguaçu 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 Nova Iguaçu this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Words at Nova Iguaçu training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Léo Rafael 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 Nova Iguaçu 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.
What was a back-page link has become a chant, and the chant is not friendly. Nova Iguaçu would rather it were settled quietly, and it has stopped being quiet.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Bill trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Nova Iguaçu will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Nova Iguaçu can pretend not to have heard.
Raul 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Léo Rafael 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Nova Iguaçu 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 Nova Iguaçu, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Vila Nova arrived with $410.0K and left with the best player in the building. The board will call it business; the queue at the ticket office will use other words.
Philippe has gone, the accounts have $410.0K in them, and the supporters have the feeling of having been sold something themselves. Good business and a good decision are not always the same thing.
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Nova Iguaçu had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
The offer from Maracanã for Matheus Miranda 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.
Pedro Henrique 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.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Antoniel Armoa has, at Nova Iguaçu, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
The phone has started ringing about Matheus Matias again, and this time the name on the line is ASA. Nova Iguaçu are listening politely and promising nothing.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Involvement in 2 goals, from a player who spent the ninety minutes doing the thing a manager actually wants: being where the ball was going to end up. 7.92 beside his name.
At 23 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.
A performance of 8.69 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Arthur Neves 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.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Paulo Teixeira, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Mota 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.
Marked 8.21. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Nova Iguaçu.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Léo Rafael 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.
Arthur Neves 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Nova Iguaçu this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
12 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Nova Iguaçu has been clear about where Philippe stands, which is more than many ever get.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Mota’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Nova Iguaçu needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Nova Iguaçu, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ruan Ribeiro signs something — a contract at Nova Iguaçu or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Ruan Ribeiro is living that version at Nova Iguaçu, and it tends to show in the first month.
Successful dribbles: 19. 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.
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.
Thomasel 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.
“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 dugout24 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Paulo Teixeira was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Nova Iguaçu dressing room was either.
Porto Vitória next, and one man in the Nova Iguaçu dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Lucas Cruz obliged against Ferroviário. 1‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Nova Iguaçu.
Mota 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.
3 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
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.
Marked 8.01 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
18 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
The dugout17 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Paulo Teixeira was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Nova Iguaçu dressing room was either.