Campeonato Brasileiro 2011 review: Round 1

After a frantic few months of state championships and cup competition for clubs in Brasil, the real work starts here as the Campeonato Brasileiro 2011 got underway this weekend with every team in action. Join me each week for a complete review of the round of games, along with weekly awards and highlights.

The 2011 season kicked off on Saturday evening at the Moacyrzão in Macaé, Rio de Janeiro as Flamengo strolled to victory against Avaí. It was quite a one-sided match as with one eye on their Copa do Brasil semi-final on Wednesday, Avaí did not look completely motivated and failed to deal with Flamengo's attacking threats. Goals from Bottinelli, Ronaldinho Gaúcho, Thiago Neves and Diego Maurício gave a 4x0 win to the Mengão.

In Minas Gerais, Atlético Mineiro got their season off to a wonderful start with a 3x0 win over Atlético Paranaense. Another game that was never really in doubt, an early goal from defensive midfielder Toró and then two headed goals from Magno Alves sealed the points for o Galo. Atlético Paranaense have reasons to be worried in the light of this result, as they failed to put any real pressure on their opponents and were very one-dimensional in attack.

Ceará and Vasco, two sides who are looking forward to vital Copa do Brasil semi-finals on Wednesday, faced eachother in Brasil's northeast and Vasco ran out 3x1 winners. There is not terribly much we can take from this match, as both sides fielded changed line-ups, resting almost all of their preferred XI. The game itself was a good one, with fringe players on both sides striving to impress. Ceará centre back Cleber gave the Vozão the lead, but three excellent goals (two from Bernardo and one from Jéferson) won the game for Vasco.

Saturday night's late game resulted in a 1x1 draw between Santos and Internacional. This game was one of the most hyped of the opening round, but with Santos fielding a complete second-string XI ahead of their Copa Libertadores semi-final this week, the match turned in to a bit of an anticlimax. Keirrison gave Santos the lead from the penalty spot after Tiago Alves was fouled by Daniel. Zé Roberto equalised for Inter before half time, converting a cross from Oscar. Both sides had chances in the second half, but neither could find the winning goal.

Moving on to Sunday afternoon, and out in the São Paulo countryside in São José do Rio Preto, Palmeiras got off to a winning start by beating Botafogo 1x0. As many had expected it was a tight game, neither side dominating completely, but Palmeiras had the edge and sealed the three points with a stunning goal from captain Kléber. There was more good news for the Verdão when club ídolo Pierre made a late substitute appearance. The defensive midfielder had been suffering from a long term injury, his last match coming in November 2010.

In one of the biggest games of the weekend, Grêmio and Corinthians faced off in what was a tight clash, ending 2x1 to the away side Corinthians. Grêmio took the lead with a penalty from Douglas after Chicão was adjudged to have fouled Leandro inside the area. O Timão equalised with their own penalty kick not long afterwards, Liedson being tripped by Lúcio, and captain Chicão made up for his earlier error by tucking away the penalty. Corinthians sealed the comeback ten minutes later through Liedson, the former Sporting Lisbon hitman pulled off a lovely bit of technique with a flying volley from six yards.

The other two afternoon games threw up some surprises, Coritiba falling 0x1 to Atlético Goianiense, and newly-promoted Figueirense pulling off an excellent 1x0 win against title favourites Cruzeiro. The former was a tight affair, with both teams making several mistakes in the midfield and struggling to establish a rhythm. The match was won with fifteen minutes left, with o Dragão's giant striker Marcão latching on to a Thiago Feltri cross.

In Florianópolis, Figueirense pulled off the shock of the week against Cruzeiro, and they were well worth the three points. Figueira found it difficult in the first half, but after taking the lead through a fortuitous own goal from Cruzeiro midfielder Marquinhos Paraná, they pressed their opponents and looked likely to score a second. Cruzeiro may have reasons to be worried.

The evening games on Sunday kicked off with Fluminense taking on São Paulo at Vasco's São Januario stadium. São Paulo ran out 2x0 winners, but it was not a particularly impressive display from either side. The first half was filled with errors from both teams, with Dagoberto's opening goal the only highlight. In the second half, São Paulo improved slightly while Fluminense did not, and wonderkid Lucas increased the lead with a superb goal.

The final game of the round was perhaps the most exciting, as two newly-promoted sides América Mineiro and Bahia faced off against eachother in Sete Lagoas. The match began at an excellent pace, with Bahia in the driving seat, and they took the lead with the weekend's fourth penalty. Thiago Carleto handled the ball in the area and Souza converted the penalty to put Bahia 1x0 up.

In the second half it was América who took control, equalising in the 3rd minute with a debut goal from Rodriguinho. O Coelho kept up the pressure, and could have won the game with the chances they had, but they got there in the end, with substitute Alessandro making it 2x1 with only three minutes left to go.

PLAYER OF THE ROUND: Ronaldinho Gaúcho (Flamengo)

Photo: Fábio Castro

Hated on Friday, loved on Saturday, Ronaldinho Gaúcho's performance at the weekend paints a clear picture of the fickle nature of Brazilian football supporters. After being criticised, booed and ridiculed after Flamengo's Copa do Brasil exit, Ronaldinho won over the haters by turning in a man-of-the-match performance in Fla's 4x0 win over Avaí.

His little touches, flicks and nutmegs made you feel like you were back in the Camp Nou in 2005, and his goal was very well taken also. If Ronaldinho can stay fit and in this type of form, it would be hard to look past Flamengo for the title.

VILLAIN OF THE ROUND: Marcelo Oliveira (Coritiba)

Photo: Paulo Pinto

Manager of the league's 'surprise package' Coritiba, Marcelo Oliveira could not have had a worse start to the 2011 season. With their first game at home to relegation candidates Atlético Goianiense and with a vital Copa do Brasil semi-final against Ceará on Wednesday, it was expected that Oliveira would select a changed side and allow his big players extra rest before their cup match. However, Coritiba took to the field at the Couto Pereira with a full strength side, battled hard but lost 1-0 to their organised opponents.

What does this mean for Coritiba? Well, with a full strength side they failed to win at home against a side who are certain to be battling against the drop this year, and on Wednesday they will be playing Ceará who did decide to rest their main XI this weekend. If the Coxa make it through their semi-final safely then this result will be forgotten, but if they do not, Coritiba fans will surely point the finger at the manager.

GOLAÇO DA RODADA: Lucas (SÃO PAULO vs Fluminense)



The first golaço da rodada award of the season goes to Lucas of São Paulo for his magnificent solo effort against Fluminense. The hotly tipped young attacker picked the ball up just inside the Fluminense half, played a quick one-two with Carlinhos Paraiba and then set off on a wonderful dribble, showing off his superb acceleration and leaving the Fluminense defenders floundering, before cutting inside away from Gum and finishing coolly past goalkeeper Ricardo Berna. A truly excellent goal from a young forward who is set to have a huge season this year.

So there we have it, the 2011 Brasileirão is fully underway, and already there is plenty to talk about. Will Flamengo stroll to the title with the good form of Ronaldinho Gaúcho? Did the experts get it wrong with Coritiba? Do Cruzeiro really have a team capable of winning the title this year? We can not possibly know the answers to these questions yet, but it's certainly going to be fun to find out!

This week we have the second legs of the Copa do Brasil semi-finals on Wednesday, as Coritiba play Ceará (first leg 0-0) and Avaí take on Vasco (first leg 1-1). Wednesday also brings us Santos' Copa Libertadores semi-final first leg against Paraguayans Cerro Porteño. The two sides were in the same group in the opening stage of the tournament, drawing 1x1 in Paraguay and Santos coming out 2x1 winners in São Paulo.

At the weekend we also have another full card in the Brasileirão, the pick of the action coming on Sunday afternoon as Palmeiras travel to Sete Lagoas to play Cruzeiro.

ROUND 1 RESULTS:
Flamengo 4x0 Avaí
Atlético Mineiro 3x0 Atlético Paranaense
Ceará 1x3 Vasco
Santos 1x1 Internacional
Palmeiras 1x0 Botafogo
Coritiba 0x1 Atlético Goianiense
Figueirense 1x0 Cruzeiro
Grêmio 1x2 Corinthians
Fluminense 0x2 São Paulo
América Mineiro 2x1 Bahia

Brasileirão In Focus: Corinthians

Corinthians, o Timão, the biggest team in São Paulo state and truly one of the giants in the Brazilian game. They have a significantly different team to the one that finished 3rd in last season’s Brasileirão, with the retirement of Ronaldo Fenômeno and the departures of Roberto Carlos, Jucilei and Elias. Despite these losses, they still managed to make the final of the Campeonato Paulista, partially thanks to the signing of former Sporting Lisbon forward Liedson.

This transfer window has been a busy one for Corinthians, and there seems to be a lot more to come. Bruno Cesar will leave in June to sign for Benfica, and striker Dentinho has sealed a move to Ukraine with Shakhtar Donetsk. The really interesting part is the players coming in. Since the end of the 2010 Brasileirão, o Timão have recruited names like Liedson, Fábio Santos, Adriano, Emerson and ex-Spartak Moscow midfielder Alex. Roma’s Fábio Simplício appears to be close to signing, and there are strong rumours regarding the signings of AC Milan’s Clarence Seedorf, Paulo Henrique Ganso from Santos and André of Dynamo Kiev.

This is a team who certainly have what it takes to win the league, with some of the best players in Brazil at their disposal, especially if they go on to sign any of the other names mentioned. Perhaps their only weak spot is their coach, Tite. Not a bad coach by any means, but since he has been in charge of Corinthians it has not seemed like the fans have been particularly won over by him. He failed to win the 2010 Brasileirão last season, was knocked out by Deportes Tolima in the qualifying rounds of the 2011 Copa Libertadores, and now suffered in the Paulistão final. You feel that Tite needs instant results, and any more disappointment in the near future will leave him out of a job.

Without knowing the extent of their activity in the transfer market, it is hard to pinpoint a formation for Corinthians, but with the players they have under contract currently, they will play a 4-2-3-1. Fábio Santos and Alessandro play left and right back respectively, dominating the flanks. In the midfield, Ralf is the holding man, and he is partnered by Paulinho, who is a little more athletic and mobile. The attacking three (for the time being) should line up with Jorge Henrique, Alex and Willian, and Liedson is the first choice at centre forward.

Expected formation:

International weekend part one- 05 September

Right, first proper entry then. Saturday 5th September, plenty Internationals played all over the world. Obviously my attention was focussed on Scotland-Macedonia, but there was also some other interesting matches available for me on the tube.

ESPN provided me with Denmark-Portugal in Group 1, but Sky Sports had plenty. Not only did they show Scotland-Macedonia and Cyprus-Republic of Ireland, but also some South American games, with Peru-Uruguay, Paraguay-Bolivia, and undoubtedly the biggest game in the world that night, Argentina-Brasil.

First up, Scotland-Macedonia. Ok, most of you will know the situation going into this game, if not, I'll quickly post up the table as it stood before this one.



Ok as you can see from that (or not, it is a little small), Macedonia, Scotland and Norway each have two games to battle it out for second place. Macedonia finish with two away games, Scotland and then Norway on Wednesday. Scotland have the opposite and play their last two games at Hampden against Macedonia and group winners Holland. Norway go away to Reykjavik to play Iceland, and then as mentioned, finish at home to Macedonia. So essentially, Scotland-Macedonia was a must-win for us, as we wouldnt want to go in to the final game knowing we have to beat the Netherlands.

Ok, phew, that's the background out of the way, now to the game. We lined up with what I think is near enough my favourite formation for Scotland, the 4-4-2. Sky had it down as a 4-3-3 with Fletcher and McFadden playing wingers to Miller as a centre forward, but in the game it seemed more of a 4-4-2, with Faddy on the left of midfield with the combination of Fletcher, Alexander and Brown making up the rest of the midfield, and Fletcher and Miller playing as the two forwards. Perhaps the only change I would have made was to stick Maloney or Commons on the right wing, to let Brown play in centre midfield with Darren Fletcher and abandon Alexander's position (we were at home after all).

Macedonia looked like they were fielding a 4-3-3 for sure, Pandev playing centre forward with Stojkov and Naumoski on the wings. For me, Macedonia are still quite an unknown quantity, I missed the away game in Skopje that we lost 1-0 (didn't have Setanta at the time), and the only players I know in the squad are Goran Pandev (seen him plenty times for Lazio), Mitreski (saw him a few times when he was at Cottbus), and the right back Noveski.

Being a Scotland fan, I thought the first half was crap. Scotland didn't look smart in possession, with Macedonia actually looking quite good. They had a really nice style when on the ball, some nice sharp passes and good movement, basically the first 20 minutes was a big reminder to Scotland that these guys know how to play football. Pandev looked a level above our defence, drawing a few fouls out of Davie Weir in good positions, and playing some lovely passes and also came close with a shot on goal that Gordon parried away nicely.
Scotland started to gain a wee bit of momentum in the rest of the first half, Scott Brown most definately the best player in dark blue. And the wee man was involved in by far the most interesting moment of the first half, when he "unsportingly" challenged for a bounce ball and thumped it off Mitreski and out for a Scotland corner.

Ok, here's my view on this: I know what Broony did wasnt exactly sportsmanlike, but people that know him as a player know he often employs some tactics designed purely to piss off his opponents, and this one worked. Just by hitting the ball against Mitreski, he rattled near enough the whole Macedonia squad, which really showed in the second half, and in my opinion, went some way in helping us win the match. I'm sure you've watched many a cup final or crunch game where someone is down on the ground injured, and you've willed the player with the ball to just play on instead of booting the ball out so it can go back to the keeper. Also it showed Broony's motivation for this particular game, as in truth this was as important as a cup final. So, I hope people realise Scott didnt do that because he is an unsportsmanlike arsehole, but because he has a competitive nature. Although admittedly I don't want to see that every week, Fair Play "rules" should be respected, but in this situation I feel Brown didnt do anything wrong.

Another thing that came from the Brown incident was the bookings of McFadden and Despotovski. I haven't looked back on the little bit of shoving and things that happened post-Broonygate, but I don't remember seeing Faddy involved. When both players were shown yellow cards, they both seemed completely bemused, asking why they were given the bookings. Couldn't comment really, but from what I saw it didnt look like either player deserved a yellow card, and yellow cards that will keep both players out of their final qualifying games unfortunately.

Now then, the second half. The first talking point for myself was when the teams came back out, they were seperated in the tunnel by security because of Scott Brown annoying everyone in the Macedonia team. Sorry but that is hilarious. Moving on... If I was a neutral I would have loved the start of the second half of this game. Both defences looked terrible, for Macedonia, Mitreski looked rocked by Brown's behaviour earlier on, and his partner Sedloski just looked like a poor player. For us, the fact that Mick McManus was lacking game time and Davie Weir's arthritis was setting in, was starting to show. Combine this with two teams searching for a goal and you get a very end-to-end match.

McFadden missed an excellent chance roughly 5 minutes into the second half, shaping up with his left foot, coming back inside onto his weaker right foot, and subsequently booting the ball out of the stadium. The game then went right up the other end, where Pandev (having a great game) made a rare mistake of judgement by choosing not to pass to Stojkov who had an open goal, and instead hitting the ball straight at Craig Gordon.

Scotland took the lead a few minutes later, a lovely ball from Steven Fletcher and an even better glancing header from (yes you guessed it) Scott Brown. Naturally I went crazy, as we all did I'm sure, but in such an open game like that, to get the first goal was so so important. And yes, such a great goal it was.

Thankfully after the goal went in, Weir and McManus started to sharpen up, while Mitreski and Sedloski still looked second-rate. Shaun Maloney and Paul Hartley later replaced the two involved in the first goal, Steven Fletcher and Scott Brown. Scotland kept up the pressure and eventually sealed the game after 80 minutes with another memorable goal. This time it was the turn of James McFadden to get the goal, after dribbling from the centre spot, past a couple of Macedonia defenders, Faddy rounded the keeper and put the ball into the empty net. A really really good goal, here's a video if you missed it.



Anyway, at that point it was game over, and with that three points we find ourselves in second spot with 10 points, after Norway could only draw 1-1 with Iceland later in the evening (YESSSS!). It looks nice, but in truth it still means we may need to take something from the game on Wednesday against the Netherlands... Unfortunately I'm in work on Wednesday. Maybe I could ask to finish at 5.

Next game I watched (don't worry I wont go on about it as much) was Denmark-Portugal. Going into the game Denmark sat on top of Group 1, with 16 points in 6 matches, unlike Portugal who found themselves third with only 9 points from 6 games. Admittedly I hadn't seen terribly much of either of these teams for a while, but both sides have quite a few recognisable players.

There was a bit of pretext to this game, with Portugal including Brazilian-born Liedson in their squad due to the fact that he has a Portuguese passport. For most people who are in the know about Scottish football, this is the same situation as the talk about Nacho Novo playing a game for Scotland. It's a discussion for another day, but when nations like Portugal (who we may well have ended up competing for a play off place with) are fielding "foreign" players like Liedson, Pepe and Deco, then maybe we should make use of what we have and start bringing in the uncapped talent we have here in the SPL.

Passports aside, this was an important game for both sides, with a win for Denmark all but confirming their place in the 2010 World Cup, and anything but a win for Portugal putting them in real trouble of missing out on the trip to South Africa. The first half was pretty cagey, with an excellent finish by Arsenal boy Nicklas Bendtner separating the two teams at the break. However with the 'man-about-town' Liedson coming off the bench at half time to get his first cap for his adopted homeland, Portugal started to gain a bit more direction about their football.

Sure enough Portugal nicked a late equaliser through a Liedson header, and the game finished 1-1. A decent game, neither of the sides played particularly well, but I mean a few years ago, you would have expected Portugal to win this match comfortably.

Times have changed for the Portuguese, the first Golden Generation have moved on (Figo, Rui Costa, Nuno Gomes) and now the new Golden Generation are upon us, with Cristiano Ronaldo, Nani, Simao, Deco, Quaresma et al plying their trade for the national team. There's only one problem: the new Golden Generation havent got the slightest idea how to play together. This is probably due to the fact they now have super-duper-mega-egos in Ronaldo, Quaresma and Nani, players that would rather skin a few more defenders and chip the keeper than just play an easy pass to their strike partner for an easy finish.

Ronaldo and Nani are (were in Ronaldo's case) successful at Man Utd because of Alex Ferguson. Quaresma could be successful under Jose Mourinho. This is because these managers just dont accept that one player is bigger than the team, in the case of the Portuguese national team, you get the feeling every player thinks they are bigger than the team. They need a good boss ASAP, as Quieroz is failing.

Ok well this was much longer than I thought. Ill try to write "Part two" tomorrow with some thoughts on Cyprus-Ireland and of course, the big one, Argentina-Brasil which I'm watching as I speak.