There were 85 minutes on the clock and Botafogo had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Fluminense did not stop to explain themselves.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Agner has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Fluminense this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fluminense they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The unbeaten run reaches 7. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Fluminense training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jefferson Savarino 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.
America Mineiro are out and Fluminense go through, 3‑1 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
A brace, and John Kennedy takes the afternoon — 9.06
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. John Kennedy provided it, and the 9.06 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.94 at 40, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Thiago Silva 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.
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.
Level with 95 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Fluminense had all but put away. Flamengo will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
In brief
The dugoutHulk has become a man the manager trusts
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Fluminense hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Paulo Peixoto 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Tiago Batista is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. João Barbosa is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Flamengo next, which means a week that starts on Monday. Everything else on this page will be forgotten by Saturday; this fixture will not be forgotten for a year.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 95. Juventude had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Fluminense heard it as anything else.
Thiago Silva 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jefferson Savarino was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Germán Cano. 1‑0 against Santos, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
10 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 dugout3 Aug 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Leonardo Neves, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.