From our football correspondent
Steady
Match12 Aug 2026
A 2‑0 win over Ceará, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Maik, 21, 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 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Squad17 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sport Recife this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Artur 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 terraces17 Aug 2026
Sport Recife supporters have found a favourite in Maik
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Maik 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.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Marked 8.64 — 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
No hiding place for Enzo Díaz
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Enzo Díaz, and the manager let it.
Squad17 Aug 2026
27 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.15 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Market10 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Marcos Antonio and Sport Recife agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad10 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sport Recife this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market10 Aug 2026
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Sport Recife heard it as anything else.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Victor Sá runs at them all day
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 7.97, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Jonathan Calleri commits to Sport Recife for another 2 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Jonathan Calleri 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
Enzo Díaz wants to know where this is going
“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 Sport Recife hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Lucas Moura 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.
Match1 Aug 2026
2‑3 to São Paulo, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad3 Aug 2026
No hiding place for Artur
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Artur, and the manager let it.
Market3 Aug 2026
24 months and counting on Lucas Moura
Still no offer on the table, and Lucas Moura’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 15. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.