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.
Hugo 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 at Corinthians 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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Gustavo Henrique 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Corinthians training over how hard people work
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Corinthians is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Félix Torres 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.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad20 Mar 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Pablo Maia's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Orlando City will make the call about Felipe Longo this week. Corinthians have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Corinthians will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Corinthians will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Corinthians heard it as anything else.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Corinthians have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 48 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Corinthians have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 57 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Corinthians may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Félix Torres 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 66 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
17 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Corinthians lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Pablo Maia's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Hugo Souza signs something — a contract at Corinthians or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The words a physio says slowly. 27 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The name of Dieguinho has come up in conversations Corinthians were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad17 Jan 2028
Félix Torres 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.
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.
André 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.
Squad10 Jan 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Gabriel Paulista's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
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.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Corinthians have had the benefit of it.
Player ratings3 Jan 2028
André, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.69
A mark of 7.69 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Marked 9.23 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Rodrigo Garro at his very best
Yuri Alberto 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.
Marked 9.30 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
The phone has started ringing about Dieguinho again, and this time the name on the line is Ceará. Corinthians are listening politely and promising nothing.
Player ratings20 Dec 2027
Mojmír Chytil was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.34. 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.
Qualification is done, and next season the floodlights come on for something bigger. A stage for the players, oxygen for the accounts and a passport for everybody else.
29 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Corinthians will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Iseppe has just signed for Corinthians, and for once the answer mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
10 goals and a season average of 7.46. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Player ratings13 Dec 2027
Yuri Alberto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.11. 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.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Cruzeiro the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Corinthians will enjoy reviewing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Pedro Raul 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.
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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Corinthians may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings29 Nov 2027
A brace, and Mojmír Chytil takes the afternoon — 8.92
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mojmír Chytil provided it, and the 8.92 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.35 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“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 Corinthians hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Corinthians is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Corinthians and Fluminense, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
A 4‑2 win over Fluminense, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad29 Nov 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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 hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Favela did not need any: 8.36, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
22 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
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.
Kaio César 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.
At 21 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.
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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
5 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Corinthians is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad1 Nov 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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 touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
In brief
Player ratingsThe one thing Mojmír Chytil could not do
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matheus Pereira 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.
A performance of 8.47 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings25 Oct 2027
Pablo Maia was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.11. 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.
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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad18 Oct 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Pedro Raul, and the manager let it.
Player ratings18 Oct 2027
Yuri Alberto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.66. 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.
9 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Cacá’s exile
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Félix Torres’s exile
Dieguinho, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.64
A mark of 8.64 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Corinthians heard it as anything else.
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.
Kaio César 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Dieguinho 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.
9 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.89 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
1 for Gabriel Paulista, marked 7.56, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Corinthians they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Gabriel Paulista and Corinthians agree another 2 years.
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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.84 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Rodrigo Garro. 4‑3 against Flamengo, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
7 goals in one match, Rodrigo Garro on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Corinthians and Flamengo.
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.
Kaio César 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.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.15 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Jorge Yriarte has just signed for Corinthians, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Breno Bidon 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.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
Paysandu will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Corinthians were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.50 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Corinthians is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Yuri Alberto 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.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Hugo Souza: 4 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Sport Recife kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Corinthians will be asked about the last half hour all week.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Corinthians have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Two goals and a mark of 8.42 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.48 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
26 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
23 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.47 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The offer from Real Sociedad for Gui Negão 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.
“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 Corinthians hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Yuri Alberto. 4‑3 against Vitória, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
7 goals in one match, Yuri Alberto on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Corinthians and Vitória.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 9.10 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
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.
Kaio César 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.
9 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.
Successful dribbles: 27. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings9 Aug 2027
Gui Negão, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.74
A mark of 7.74 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Corinthians they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Memphis Depay had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Atlético Mineiro were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
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. 8.66 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Guilherme Pires 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 Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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 name of Dieguinho has come up in conversations Corinthians were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Gui Negão, and the manager let it.
Squad26 Jul 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Hugo Souza's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Parana will make the call about João Pedro Tchoca this week. Corinthians have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
22 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
2 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
34 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Internacional the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Corinthians will enjoy reviewing.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 29 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.54 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
21 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Position 3, 23 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
“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 Corinthians, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alex Santana will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Corinthians the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
Kaio César 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“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 Corinthians, and it is not being withdrawn.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bahia is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Kawê has just signed for Corinthians, and for once the answer mattered.
Matheuzinho 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 deal that would have taken Bahia to Juventude has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Corinthians with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Slavia Prague did not want to sell and the number is why they did. $23.5M for Mojmír Chytil, and the expectation that arrives with him is the kind no amount of settling-in period softens.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Mojmír Chytil is living that version at Corinthians, and it tends to show in the first month.
“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 Corinthians hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Yuri Alberto 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.
19 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 92th minute. Bahia will replay every second of the added time for a week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Rodrigo Garro had Corinthians level again within 4 minutes, and Bragantino never got to play with a lead at all.
Squad31 May 2027
André Ramalho 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.
18 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
32 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Gui Negão did not need any: 8.52, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.06 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
17 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Raniele provided it, and the 9.08 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Two goals and a mark of 9.04 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Corinthians heard it as anything else.
3 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.
Squad17 May 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Kaio César 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.
Grêmio made Corinthians work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad10 May 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. André Ramalho 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Corinthians, and 2 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
16 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.24 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Bahia has agreed terms with Cruzeiro for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The words a physio says slowly. 15 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Two goals and a mark of 8.81 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.29 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Matheus Pereira, and the manager let it.
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
Yuri Alberto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.23. 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.
2‑0 against Talleres, and a performance that will be described to people who were not there for the rest of the season. Memphis Depay was at the centre of the description.
24 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Corinthians lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 9.20 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
15 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Favela did not need any: 7.73, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
2‑1 against Talleres, and a performance that will be described to people who were not there for the rest of the season. Raniele was at the centre of the description.
31 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Corinthians lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.58 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
14 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
5 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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Gui Negão and Corinthians agree another 5 years.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Kaio César 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 at Corinthians 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.
A window away with the national side, and a shirt at Corinthians that briefly doubles as an advertisement. A call-up flatters the player and the club that built him in the same breath.
4‑0. Nights like this are why clubs spend decades trying to qualify for this competition, and they arrive perhaps twice in that time. Everybody who was in the ground will describe it badly for years.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 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. 9.51 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
4 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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Defensive actions: 22, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
In brief
Player ratingsYuri Alberto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Lucca is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
In brief
SquadThe manager has not finished forgetting Hugo Souza's mistake
2‑1 against Junior, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
Position 1, 41 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
The 85th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Yuri Alberto decided nobody was going anywhere. Junior had no time left to answer.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Yuri Alberto 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.
“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 Corinthians hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
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.
Kaio César 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 at Corinthians 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Hugo Souza signs something — a contract at Corinthians or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Félix Torres’s exile
“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 Corinthians, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Corinthians will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
The offer from Baniyas for Felipe Longo 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad25 Jan 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Rodrigo Garro's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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 phone has started ringing about Felipe Longo again, and this time the name on the line is Maccabi Netanya. Corinthians are listening politely and promising nothing.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Pellegrin 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 Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Pradella is living that version at Corinthians, and it tends to show in the first month.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 29 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Corinthians will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
“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 Corinthians, and it is not being withdrawn.
Yuri Alberto 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.
12 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Lucca is living that version at Corinthians, and it tends to show in the first month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Felipe Longo is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The name of Zakaria Labyad has come up in conversations Corinthians were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Qualification is secured, and next season the big floodlit nights are continental ones. For the players it is a stage; for the accounts it is a lifeline; for the supporters it is passports.
2‑1 against Independiente Medellin, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
The fee is $9.2M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Sport Recife drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Pablo Maia has just signed for Corinthians, and for once the answer mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 8.77 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Yuri Alberto 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.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Corinthians has been clear about where André Ramalho stands, which is more than many ever get.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Corinthians have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Player ratings30 Nov 2026
Rodrigo Garro was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.03. 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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Matheus Bidu 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.
The 88th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Rodrigo Garro decided nobody was going anywhere. Juventude had no time left to answer.
Yuri Alberto 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.
9 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
At 22 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Marked 8.88 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
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.
1‑0 against São Paulo, and the songs went on long after the whistle. League positions come and go; days like this get retold at family dinners for years.
3‑1 against Llaneros, and a performance that will be described to people who were not there for the rest of the season. Memphis Depay was at the centre of the description.
There are goals, and then there are goals against that particular opponent. The Corinthians support have their bragging rights for a year and they know exactly whose name is on them.
“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 Corinthians hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Kaio César 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.
Marked 8.24 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
4‑1 against Llaneros, and a performance that will change how the rest of the competition talks about this club. Reputations in continental football are built in single evenings and this was one.
Two goals and a mark of 8.93 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.94 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Successful dribbles: 25. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadDefences have started doubling up on Yuri Alberto
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Raniele provided it, and the 9.54 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.
Yuri Alberto 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.
2‑2 against Independiente Medellin, and a performance that will be described to people who were not there for the rest of the season. Yuri Alberto was at the centre of the description.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 26 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Marked 9.07 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Yuri Alberto 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 finished 2‑1, and it was Memphis Depay’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Corinthians.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Pedro Raul was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.84. 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.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Yuri Alberto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.71. 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Breno Bidon 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.
Pedro Raul had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Defensor Sporting were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.52 at 35, 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 Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 8.72 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Derby days make names, and Dieguinho made his against Palmeiras. 2‑1, bragging rights secured, and one half of town will be tired of hearing about him by Tuesday.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Corinthians have their man.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Paulista 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Kaio César. 2‑1 against Sport Recife, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
A performance of 8.66 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Kaio César was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.66. 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.
An error at the back is a moment; an error in goal is a goal. Matheus Donelli knows it, the crowd knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Félix Torres’s exile
The terracesEverybody has an opinion about Zakaria Labyad
1‑2 against Vitória, and the road stops here. Cup exits are quick deaths — no second leg, no next week, just the league from now until May.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Dieguinho, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 8.17
A mark of 8.17 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Yuri Alberto 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.
At 21 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.
Marked 8.66 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Yuri Alberto had Corinthians level again within 3 minutes, and Vasco da Gama never got to play with a lead at all.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Kaio César obliged against Juventude. 1‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Corinthians.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 92th minute. Juventude will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
André, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.80
A mark of 7.80 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
A first appearance Araujo will want to forget — 5.79
Everybody's debut is one of two stories and this was the other one. 5.79, and the only consolation available is that nobody's career has ever been decided by ninety minutes in a shirt he had just been given.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
21 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Yuri Alberto 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.
Defensive actions: 22. He was first to everything and second to nothing, and the goalkeeper had an easy day because of it.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Corinthians training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matheus Bidu 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.
Nobody at Corinthians 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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Yuri Alberto 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.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Memphis Depay in the middle of it, and Botafogo unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
“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 Corinthians hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Corinthians this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Yuri Alberto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.93. 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.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Memphis Depay was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.28. 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.
Marked 8.26 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.