Brasileiro: Not Every Round is a Sao Paulo Round
Bruno Romani | Sep 21, 2009 | Comments 1
The 25th round of Brasileirao had all the elements to belong one more time to Sao Paulo. Inter visited Vitoria – always a tough match. Sao Paulo “visited” Santo Andre (piece of cake) and Palmeiras will visit Cruzeiro on Wednesday. But the tricolor round ended up to be a green round. The green of Palmeiras, who is celebrating without even stepping on the pitch.
Everything started on Saturday, as Inter went to the Barradao stadium, place where the home team lost one single match in the tournament. Inter played a decent first-half, and wasted a few good chances – helping to make the name of the weird Colombian goalie Viafara. In the second-half, Vitoria looked dangerous most of the time thanks again to the good forward Neto Berola. And two set-pieces cemented the fate of Inter. First, Uelliton, the same man who opened the score last week against Palmeiras, used his head. Later, forward Roger took a penalty, reached his 12th goal in the league and gave final numbers to the match.
With the great Saturday, the Sunday looked promising to Sao Paulo. It was going to Santo Andre, a club who has in its starting line-up 42 year-old defensive midfielder Fernando, a man who has been around as far as I can remember. On top of that, Santo Andre decided to transfer the match for Ribeirao Preto. And, as it always happens when the big clubs play outside Sao Paulo city, the stadium was full of Sao Paulo fans, not Santo Andre. Easy? No, if arrogance is on the way. Sao Paulo scored with just 8 minutes with a beautiful goal from Jean and stopped. From that point, Sao Paulo looked over confident as if just waited for the final whistle. Before that happened, Santo Andre found a goal through Pablo Escobar (great name). And things could’ve been worse if the ref had awarded Santo Andre a penalty after Brazil international fouled retirement home super star Fernando.
With these two results, Palmeiras is smiling and rubbing its hand. Inter is stuck with 43 points. Sao Paulo reached 44. Palmeiras has 44, a better goal difference and a match to go. Palmeiras will not seat in first after Wednesday only if Cruzeiro wins 5-0.
Libertadores
As Palmeiras, Sao Paulo and Inter are not very likely to leave the Libertadores zone, only one spot is left for 3 clubs in the top 4 (4 clubs if Corinthians is counted, but the club is already in the Libertadores). Goias, Atletico-MG and Gremio are also protagonists of a tough fight. And this weekend wasn’t good for Atletico-MG.
The result for Atletico wasn’t that bad by itself. Visiting Nautico, even when the club is fighting relegation is always tough. And the nil draw cannot be regarded as terrible. But what Goias and Gremio did was remarkable – particularly for the former.
Goias visited Corinthians at Pacaembu, which had 35 thousand fans to watch the return of Ronaldo. The phenomenon was returning after the lipo and the hand surgery. The stars of the night, however, were forwards Fernandao and Iarley, right-back Vitor and midfielder Julio Cesar. With just 23 minutes, Goias was winning – one goal for each of the mentioned forwards. In the beginning of the second-half, Iarley scored another. When Dentinho scored the first for Corinthians was too late, and Goias had time to scored the 4th with defender Joao Paulo. It was the first time Corinthians conceives four goals in a match under coach Mano Menezes. On the other side, coach Helio dos Anjos said confirmed what many thought: it had been the best match of his team in the league. And with that, Goias is in 4th again.
Gremio had also a good Sunday. It took on the dead side of Fluminense and had no difficulty to cause an avalanche of goals. Souza, great midfielder, scored twice. Tcheco from the spot and Jonas, one of the top scorers of the league with 13 goals, also scored. It was so easy that, in 22 minutes of action, Gremio scored three times. And as a dead side, Fluminense had time to score an own goal with defender Cassion. Fluminense’s goal was scored by Kieza. Gremio reached 39 points – it is in 6th. Fluminense has no scape: it has only 18 points, 8 points behind the first side outside the relegation zone.
Relegation
The round wasn’t good for those trying to scape from the second division. None of them won. As we saw, Nautico and Santo Andre tied and Fluminense lost. Botafogo and Sport were also unable to take advantage of that.
Sport visited Atletico-PR. With just one minute, it allowed Marcinho to score the only goal of the match. In this way, Sport is stucj with 20 points – the second the last in the table.
Botafogo had a result which by itself is not bad. A nil draw against Santos at Vila Belmiro usually is not bad. But not for a club in the relegation zone. Worse than that was the level of the match – one of the worst of the tournament.
Very Nice! (Read as Borat, please)
In the safe zone of the tournament, the one with clubs neither desperate for the title or for staying in the first division, is where some of the fun took place in this round.
Avai won again after 3 matches. And it wasn’t just a victory. It was a sound 4-0 against Barueri – goals by William, Eltinho, Muriqui (who, along with midfielder Marquinhos, was the best on the pitch) and Léo Gago (who scored one of the nicest goals of the weekend)
At Maracana, Flamengo massacred Coritiba in a night of beautiful goals. Adriano, top scorer with 13 goals, visited the net again. Veteran Serbian midfielder Petkovic and Willians also battled for the most beautiful goal of the night.
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I think we should wait until Wednesday to say something. Because if Palmeiras loses that game (no matter what the score is), I would say it was still a Sao Paulo Round. They would be tied in points, and Palmeiras would have stumbled once again.