What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Iguatu can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Iguatu this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Words at Iguatu training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hebert 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.
Every squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Eron is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
In brief
The dugoutSérgio Lopes knocks on the manager’s door
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.
Wendel and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Iguatu training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mateus Macedo 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.
Every squad is half players the manager chose and half players he inherited. Eron was chosen, the man who chose him has gone, and he starts again from nothing under the next one.
Position 16 and 8 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.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Palmeiras is saying, and nobody at Iguatu is enjoying the guessing.
Gonzalo Sena 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 academy exists for exactly this morning. Gato has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
São Bernardo 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.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Iguatu training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pedro Amaral 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 9 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Iguatu will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.88 for the rest of it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Iguatu this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Iguatu will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Iguatu training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hebert 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. Arthur Fonseca 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Bruno Lopes 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.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Iguatu will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Yan Victor 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Diego 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. Leonardo Moreira 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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Caio Soares 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Diego Cavalcante after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Águia de Marabá in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Paulo Barbosa