Danillo Ribeiro 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 Tsumita was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Maranhão know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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. Maranhão will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
A season-long audition: Goiás still own him, but the shirt and the minutes are Maranhão's to give. A loan is a bet both clubs believe they are winning.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Maranhão have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Sport Recife keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Anderson Sobral 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.
Maranhão have made the call to Goiás. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Squad21 Dec 2026
5 new faces, and Maranhão 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 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 doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Maranhão will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Maranhão know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
10 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.
Danillo Ribeiro 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.
Half the programme played, position 12, 13 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Márcio Lima to a room that had heard them before.
Every debut is a small story about the future: Carlos Teixeira, 14 years old, off the academy pitches and into the first team. The parents in the stand will keep the programme.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Maranhão know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
7 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.
Caíke Duarte 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Márcio Lima after 2‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Renato Fernandes has come out of that comparison in the side, and Maranhão have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Maranhão than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Edqui Amaro signs something — a contract at Maranhão or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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 Maranhão this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Maranhão will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Maranhão, another week without a signature from Caíke Duarte.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Tsumita scored, was marked 7.59, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
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 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.
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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Maranhão and Sampaio Corrêa, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Márcio Xavier is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Beaten 6 times, with 2 saves for company. Goalkeepers carry these scorelines on their record whoever actually caused them, which is the quiet injustice of the job.
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
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 0‑6 Márcio Lima left the room before anybody could ask which.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Maranhão know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Maranhão know which stage they are at.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Maranhão are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Maranhão, another week without a signature from Tássio.
Squad24 Aug 2026
8 new faces, and Maranhão 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 supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.