The deal with Corinthians 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Capital this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Everybody at Capital saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 34 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
Capital asked and Atlético Mineiro said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Marcos Soares 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Capital know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Gabriel Robledo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Words at Capital training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guilherme Lazaroni 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.
Every club in football 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 somebody has tried it.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Capital know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Neto signs something — a contract at Capital or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
A season-long audition: Santos still own him, but the shirt and the minutes are Capital's to give. A loan is a bet both clubs believe they are winning.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Capital have done the hard part with São Paulo, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Wesley Rodrigues 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.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Grêmio have kept their man, and Capital go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Jerfesson trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 22 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Two goals and a mark of 8.36 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 8.18 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Gabriel Robledo 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.
6 goals in one match, Bismarck on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Capital and Luverdense.
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.
They paid twice — for the ticket and for the journey — and got a 4-2 win for it. Away support is the truest kind precisely because nothing about it is convenient.
In brief
The dugoutJerfesson dropped after a run of poor form
The dugoutThe manager’s verdict
The dugoutJoão Gabriel asks for a word with the manager
30 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Capital lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Gabriel Robledo 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Iván Tello 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.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Capital would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Capital know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
38 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Capital lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Bismarck 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Capital training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Robledo 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.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad9 Nov 2026
27 new faces, and Capital 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.
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.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.30 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Gabriel Robledo 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.
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.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Douglas Guimarães kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Every signing waits for it and every press conference asks about it until it comes. It has come, Capital have their man off the mark, and the second one is always easier.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Capital are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Neto provided it, and the 8.52 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Two of the goals had his name somewhere on them, which is the afternoon a manager wants from anybody asked to both create and finish. 7.65, and 2 involvements.
7 goals in one match, Neto on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Capital and Goianésia.
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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Capital training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Robledo 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.
At 36, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Alberto Montiel was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Diogo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Gabriel Robledo 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. João Gabriel has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Bismarck. 2‑0 against Aparecidense, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Capital training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Da Silva 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.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.59 on the card, and the Capital support went home talking about one name.
The dugout21 Sep 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.” Douglas Guimarães, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Capital know which stage they are at.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Jonathan has, at Capital, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Capital this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Capital will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
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.
It needed Alberto Montiel to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Maricá, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Douglas Guimarães was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Capital dressing room was either.
GAS will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Maracanã were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Matheus Pacheco kept it short after the 3‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.