Gabriel Mec 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.
“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.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Manaus will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Independência? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Nobody at Manaus 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 12 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
José Aquino Allende 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Rodrygo Ribeiro after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Squad2 Nov 2026
5 new faces, and Manaus 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.
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 is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.83 at 37, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Manaus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is 17 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.
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.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Cauã Lucca has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 9 combined actions and a mark of 6.68, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Rodrygo Ribeiro chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Rafael Mariano’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Manaus needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Manaus. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Marcelo Borges, 17, plays like he has been here for years — 7.63
A mark of 7.63 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 17-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 17 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.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Manaus, and both men came out saying it was fine.
At 17 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Arthur Cunha
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
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.
6 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Manaus can tell you which week it ends in.
José Aquino Allende 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Carlos Braga is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Rodrygo Ribeiro after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.