Fabinho 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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Words at Sampaio Corrêa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Esli García 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 makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Sampaio Corrêa will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Sampaio Corrêa will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Paulo Ricardo signs something — a contract at Sampaio Corrêa or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Thalles and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Esli García 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 manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Ricardo Cardozo has his answer from Sampaio Corrêa; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
“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 Sampaio Corrêa will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ricardo Cardozo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Paulo Ricardo signs something — a contract at Sampaio Corrêa or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nobody at Sampaio Corrêa 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.
Training is not playing and everybody in the game knows it. Matheus Soares has gone out on loan to a club that wants him in the side rather than around it, and he will come back either a better player or an answered question.
6 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Two goals and a mark of 8.08 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sampaio Corrêa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Thalles 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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Eduardo Pacheco on a 2‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
At 22 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sampaio Corrêa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
22 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.
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 Soares is on it.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Sampaio Corrêa would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Clebson trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Gustavo Furtado provided it, and the 8.50 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Chances created: 19. Nothing on the scoresheet and everything in the match: the pass before the pass, over and over, until the defence stopped guessing right.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Sampaio Corrêa and Humaitá, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
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. 12 actions, 7.21, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
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.
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.
In brief
Squad5 new faces, and Sampaio Corrêa are still learning each other