“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Boa can pretend not to have heard.
Squad15 Nov 2027
Ignacio Lema 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 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.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Position 9, 19 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Squad1 Nov 2027
Ignacio Lema 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.
Alexander García and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout1 Nov 2027
Alan Cardoso loses the manager who believed in him
A change in the dugout is not one story, it is twenty-five of them. This is Alan Cardoso's: he was somebody's player, and now he has to be somebody else's, starting from nothing.
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 Boa, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Boa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Oct 2027
Lucas Perdomo 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.
In brief
The dugoutLipe Veloso knocks on the manager's door
“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 Boa, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
At 21 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.
Phillipe Gabriel 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.
Squad23 Aug 2027
Ignacio Lema 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 23 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.
Marked 8.12 — 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe team sheet said everything about Lipe Veloso
“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 Boa, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Chikhura waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Boa is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
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.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Lucas Perdomo 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.
Both clubs in the mire, one fixture between them, and a ground that will be louder and more frightened than at any point in the season. Boa know what is at stake and so does everybody in the away end.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Boa scored in the 90th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Alexander García had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ignacio Lema was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is 23 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 5 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Palmeiras keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ignacio Lema 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 shaken hands with Mirassol; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 0 arrived, 2 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Boa have done the hard part with Fluminense, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Boa can tell you which week it ends in.
“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 Boa, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Chikhura waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Boa is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Boa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
5 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.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Palmeiras is saying, and nobody at Boa is enjoying the guessing.
Phillipe Gabriel 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 11 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Boa can pretend not to have heard.
Transfer targets28 Jun 2027
$1.3M settles it between the clubs for Fernandinho
Mirassol have accepted the money. What Boa do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
At 21 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.
Phillipe Gabriel 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.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Ignacio Lema 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The deal with Gimnasia y Esgrima 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ignacio Lema 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 manager has re-ordered his thinking and Wendell 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.
Alexander García 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.
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.
“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.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ignacio Lema was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Ignacio Lema 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.
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 Anderson Carvalho is on it.
“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 Boa will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Position 9 and 7 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Phillipe Gabriel is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Boa asked and Mirassol said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lucas Perdomo 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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 35 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Boa is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
9 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 23 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.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
The deal with Bragantino 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 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.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Boa will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
“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 Boa 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 Lucas Perdomo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The words a physio says slowly. 97 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Ignacio Lema 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.
Alexander García 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.
146 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Boa lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ignacio Lema was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Boa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Figueiredo is 20, and Boa 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.
At 37 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.88 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Alexander García has, at Boa, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ignacio Lema 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 no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Rafão has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Rodrygo Amaral is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Júnior Neves has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.