“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Horizonte can pretend not to have heard.
Horizonte did not want this conversation and are having it anyway. A manager wanted elsewhere is a manager whose next contract talk just became more expensive.
Horizonte offered $3.3M; CSA said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at CSA is saying, and nobody at Horizonte is enjoying the guessing.
Luís Nogueira 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.
Squad7 Feb 2028
César Amaral 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.
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Carlos Angulo is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
In brief
Squad6 new faces, and Horizonte are still learning each other
Horizonte asked and América 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.
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.
Yair Kumru 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.
Atlético Mineiro have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Horizonte, 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 Juan Manuel García is on it.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Horizonte will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
At 19 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.
Guilherme Gomes 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 name of Samuel Fernandes has come up in conversations Horizonte were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Horizonte have made the call to Criciúma. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Nobody at Horizonte 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Horizonte, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Guilherme Gomes 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Larson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Nobody at Horizonte 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Horizonte, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Horizonte has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
He is 19, he is averaging 7.08, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Guilherme Gomes 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.
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.
“I watch every Horizonte game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Nova Iguaçu runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Horizonte are no longer polite ones.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Words at Horizonte training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Larson 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 phone has started ringing about Samuel Fernandes again, and this time the name on the line is Porto Vitória. Horizonte are listening politely and promising nothing.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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.
At 14 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.
Squad17 May 2027
Words at Horizonte training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ivan Dias 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 Horizonte this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Leonardo Teixeira after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
“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.
At 19 he is being measured against the rest of the division's kids and coming out in front. The senior version of this award is where the club would like this to lead.
There were 88 minutes on the clock and Lagarto had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Horizonte did not stop to explain themselves.
Player ratings10 May 2027
Akiles, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.07
A mark of 8.07 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Horizonte this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is 19 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.
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.
“I watch every Horizonte game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Amazonas runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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.
Carlos Angulo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Horizonte training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Angelo Rovegno 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.
“I watch every Horizonte game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Águia de Marabá runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Larson is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Igor Cunha has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
“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 Horizonte, and it is not being withdrawn.
The deal with Barra 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Tiago has just signed for Horizonte, and for once the answer mattered.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Guarany de Bagé have kept their man, and Horizonte go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Luís Nogueira 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.
He is 18, and nobody at Horizonte signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
The words a physio says slowly. 55 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Horizonte can pretend not to have heard.
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Flamengo keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Horizonte are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.