“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 The request is on a desk at Maricá, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Maricá have done the hard part with Portuguesa, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Felipe Carvalho 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 7.35 on 15 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Maricá and Boavista in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Octávio was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Maricá can pretend not to have heard.
Felipe Carvalho 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 Caio Vitor was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A goalkeeper’s error has no defender behind it to tidy it away. He knew before the ball crossed the line, the crowd knew a second later, and there is nothing anybody can say tonight.
The dugout8 May 2028
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Tiago Teixeira left the room before anybody could ask which.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Maricá this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Caio Vitor 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.
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.
“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.
The plan went upstairs and came back down. Nothing about that will make a headline anywhere else, and everybody who works at the training ground will remember it for years.
Nobody at Maricá 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.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Tiago Teixeira has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
“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 Maricá, and it is not being withdrawn.
Felipe Carvalho 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 accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Maricá now.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Vitor 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 squad is half players the manager chose and half players he inherited. Felipe Carvalho was chosen, the man who chose him has gone, and he starts again from nothing under the next one.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Caio Vitor signs something — a contract at Maricá or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Maricá will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Maricá this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
0‑3 to Nova Iguaçu, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Maricá is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
4 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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Maricá can tell you which week it ends in.
Denilson 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.
Squad24 May 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Felipe Carvalho 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Maricá is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
Martín Ramírez, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.64
A mark of 7.64 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.83 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
1 for Rafael Carioca, marked 7.54, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Felipe Carvalho 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.
He is 21 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rafael Carioca 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.
In brief
Player ratingsBruno Camilo did the work nobody counts — 7.56
Felipe Carvalho and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Paulo Roberto 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Maricá, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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 Heltton is on it.
Felipe Carvalho and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rafael Carioca 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 Maricá 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.
Paulo Roberto and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Felipe Carvalho 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 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 Victor Pereira is on it.
Felipe Carvalho 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.
“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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Marcelinho 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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
6 new faces, and Maricá 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.
Paulo Roberto 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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Felipe Carvalho 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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
7 new faces, and Maricá 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 clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: another club keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Felipe Carvalho and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Paulo Roberto 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.
Pedrinho is 20, and Maricá have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Maricá, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Maricá this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Boavista have kept their man, and Maricá go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Martín Ramírez, and the manager let it.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Marcelinho 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.
Nobody at Maricá 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.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Maricá would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Maricá know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Matheus Lira will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Maricá the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Paulo Roberto 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.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Words at Maricá training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Felipe Carvalho 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Maricá know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
“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.
The words a physio says slowly. 25 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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Porto Velho waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Maricá is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Maricá have done the hard part with Bragantino, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
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.
Maricá asked and Botafogo said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Rafael Carioca 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Universidad de Concepcion they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Facundo Mater 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.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Martín Ramírez has written the date down.