News: Brasileirão 2023 Série A

Botafogo won today, opening up a 12 point lead, pending Bragantino's match tomorrow.

Athletico-PR beat Grêmio, which means they're tied on 44 points, Grêmio fail to keep up with Botafogo and the Libertadores spots get more contested.

Palmeiras and Flamengo are also on 44 point and play tomorrow. Palmeiras host Atlético-MG while Flamengo go to Cruzeiro for Tite's first match in charge.

If either of them win, they will stay within 11 points of the leaders.

Meanwhile, Bragantino go to Santos and if they win, they'll stay within 9 points.

The other match left tomorrow is Fluminense vs. Corinthians. We'll see how Diniz bounces back after the international break.

 

Half-time for Cruzeiro x Flamengo. Flamengo were no different for most of the half. Had possession but couldn't create or breakthrough. Tite did switch Gerson (from right to left) and Everton Ribeiro (from left to right) near the end of the half and Flamengo got two goals, but mostly because of Cruzeiro mistakes.

The first one came from patient build up, but a bad cross. However the defense gave it right to Ayrton Lucas who did well to put it away. The second was a naive penalty on Wesley who was overlapping but could have been contained. Instead the defender went "shoulder-to-shoulder" into his back.

But the result is 2x0 for Flamengo in Tite's first match.
Meanwhile Palmeiras are down 1x0 at the half to a Hulk goal.

As a result, Flamengo are in 2nd place, pending the Bragantino match later.
If Flamengo end the round in second, on their own, pundits are going to spend the next couple of days asking if Tite can pull off a miracle and get Flamengo to catch up with Botafogo...

 

That sounds a bit drastic!

But it is a free-for-all right now in two zones:

from 11th to 18th place only 5 points separate the teams (12 to 18 only 2 points, pending Corinthians match later).

and from 4th to 9th only 3 points separate the teams. And 3rd and 2nd are not far ahead, only 1st place is way ahead. And 9th place is Fluminense at 41. If they win later, they join the big group of teams on 44 points.

11 matches left is a lot, and without much difference right now in these zones, it's impossible to really pick final standings.

About the Palmeiras x Atlético-MG match, Paulinho continues to be really solkid and I still see him as having an outside chance at a call-up for the wing.

 

Fluminense went down 1x0, then 3x1 to Corinthians, but managed to salvage a draw and might have won in the second half if not for Cassio. The referee also sent off two Flu players on the bench.

So Fluminense makes it to 42 points. The standings after 27 rounds:



All teams play Saturday or Sunday this weekend and Wednesday or Thursday next week.

 

Well, Botafogo x Athletico-PR the match of the round not because it had the leader, but because of the mess at the stadium. Intermittently interrupted by power outages it was finally suspended indefinitely in the second half at 1x1 (Botafogo scored first and Athletico tied in the first half).

Because the calendar doesn't have space for any make up games, CBF decided to schedule the rest of the game for today, behind closed-doors (because of another game in Rio, the police couldn't provide enough security for both, so the rescheduled game had to be behind closed doors).

The final after resuming today was 1x1.

Flamengo won 1x0 in a game in which Vasco actually had more chances and are now 9 points behind in third. Bragantino beat Fluminense and are only 7 points behind in second place. With only 10 matches left, both have a chance of stealing the title from Botafogo.

Palmeiras are now on their own in 4th place, with 47 points.

The other big result of course was Inter 7x1 Santos. Many people see Santos' relegation as a given, but they're still within a point of Goiás and 3 of Corinthians who only drew today.

 

Standings with 10 matches left:

 

Lucky for me I had both those defenders in my cartola team, as well as Weverton. Palmeiras carried me this week. Unfortunately my forwards did about as well as Palmeiras forwards, so it wasn't as strong a week as it could have been.

 

Most of this week's matches are today, with 2 tomorrow and 1 postponed (Botafogo x Fortaleza, because of the Saturday postponement).

Fluminense gave up 2 early goals but tied 2x2 with Goiás and it's still in the first half! Bragantino are losing at half-time and Flamengo (at Grêmio) and Palmeiras (vs. São Paulo) play later.

Could have a team within 2 games of tying Botafogo by the end of the day, or they could end the day with the same advantage and a match in hand, depending on how these key matches go.

 

Fluminense are now up 5x2 and somehow I have Cano at -0.2 points on Cartola! Unbelievable.

5 goals and he has no goals or assists and one yellow card...

 

There was a line-up preview yesterday with Endrick on the right and when I saw the actual line-up today I was happy for Endrick, playing alongside another forward and not necessarily out wide.

I should have stuck with my Palmeiras players from last week, in Cartola, but I was hesitant because it was a derby today. I was certainly not expecting 5x0.

Meanwhile, I'm still pissed Fluminense were involved in an 8-goal match but Cano got me -0.60 points!

At any rate. Fluminense move up 3 points, but Atl-MG and Athletico-PR also won, as well as Palmeiras, so all those teams kept their spots. Grêmio could fall to 8th with current results:

Flamengo is beating Grêmio 1x0 at the half right now, with a goal by Everton Cebolinha. A bit of luck for the goal, but it was one of the only concrete chances of the half and he almost wasted it but it bounced back to him and he finished well.

 

Yeah, I'm content just playing casually, it's just funny when something like that happens. I'm sure if I dug into stats I might have picked one of the other forwards for a match like today's.

Grêmio beat Flamengo 3x2. Fun ending to the match for neutrals, but very frustrating for Flamengo fans. Flamengo tried to manage most of the second half. Didn't really threaten much. Eventually Grêmio's subs started making an impact and they got 3 goals in 10 or 11 minutes.

Flamengo got one back but it was too little too late.

So, from the top 4 teams, Botafogo didn't play, but Bragantino and Flamengo fail to close the gap. Palmeiras close the gap and join Flamengo 9 points behind the leaders.

 

Santos beat Coritiba and Vasco lost at Inter, so Santos are out of the relegation zone at the end of this round.

Of course, 9 rounds to go, they have a lot of work to do to stay up.

Amazing to think Corinthians are only 3 points ahead of Santos and only 4 points out of the relegation zone.

Corinthians host Santos this Sunday. Technically it's one of Santos' "easiest" matches left, because of Corinthians placement. The only lower placed team they have left is Goiás. Santos still has to face Botafogo, Flamengo and Athletico-PR away, so they have a very tough road ahead.