“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 The request is on a desk at Horizonte, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Horizonte have done the hard part with Corinthians, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vinícius Araujo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Horizonte asked and Bahia said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Vasco da Gama 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.
Words at Horizonte training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vinícius Araujo 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.
Horizonte asked and Maricá said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“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 Horizonte will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
The minutes were not coming at Horizonte, so he will look for them at São Luiz. Everybody involved calls it development; for the player it is simply a chance to play.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Horizonte people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The offer from Anápolis for Rafael Farias was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Horizonte have done the hard part with Boavista, 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.
Paulista 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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Match21 Nov 2026
Another one collected away from home
5 on the bounce on the road for Horizonte. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 7 goals between Horizonte and Sousa, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 39 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Two goals and a mark of 8.39 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
3 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.
Rafael Farias 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 Vinícius Araujo 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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Horizonte will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Rafael Farias 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.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Horizonte will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Santa Cruz next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
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 César Bezerra is on it.
What was a back-page story is now a matter for the terraces, and the terraces do not do nuance. Horizonte would like it dealt with before it becomes the only question anybody asks.
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 Henrique Martins has written the date down.
Confiança watched Mateus Mendes again at the weekend, and this time they did not bother hiding it. Clubs only stop hiding when they want the price to start moving.
In brief
SquadThe selectors could not leave João Moreira out
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 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 8.05. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Horizonte.
The dugout21 Sep 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.” Caio Figueiredo kept it short after the 3‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at Horizonte training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vinícius Araujo 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 award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Horizonte have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Mateus Mendes is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Horizonte know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
He is 22 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.
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.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Caio Figueiredo was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Horizonte dressing room was either.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
10 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
“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.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Nomme Kalju had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Marked 10.00. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Horizonte.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Pedro Andrade was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.95. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
In brief
MatchRafael Farias among the goals in a wild afternoon
Player ratingsGuilherme Carvalho was on a different afternoon to everybody else
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Mateus Mendes at his very best