This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/soccer by /u/vvv4231 on 2025-03-29 12:01:11+00:00.
| São Paulo |
|---|
| Full name | São Paulo Futebol Clube |
|---|---|
| Nickname | Tricolor Paulista |
| Stadium | Morumbis (66,795), São Paulo |
| 2024 Season | 6th place |
| Kits | Home - Away |
| Best Campaign | Champions (1977, 1986, 1991, 2006, 2007 and 2008) |
| Manager | Luis Zubeldía |
Soul-searching
After an apathetic 2024, São Paulo Futebol Clube come into 2025 with a leaner squad and even greater challenges. In the transfer window, the club saw the departure of 11 first-team players, while only four reinforcements arrived. Despite this, the first team became stronger with the arrival of midfielder Oscar, playing the role of playmaker that had not been seen in the team for some time. The lack of investment in replacements reflects the club’s financial instability, aggravated by controversial management, which has had a negative impact on sporting planning.
In the first few months of 2025, São Paulo showed a worrying lack of consistency. In the Campeonato Paulista, the team alternated a few moments of brilliance with disappointing performances, highlighting an attack that lacked repertoire and a fragile defense, which led manager Zubeldía to return to a three-defender formation. Despite having an Oscar and Lucas Moura duo at disposal, the team seems to lack a tactical identity. In addition, Zubeldía, who is completing his first year in charge, is facing growing distrust from the fans and the press, especially for not taking advantage of talents from the youth system, such as Ryan Francisco, Lucas Ferreira and Mateus Alves, who won the Copinha at the beginning of the year.
For the rest of 2025, the prognosis is one of uncertainty. The lack of depth in the squad and managerial instability could limit the team’s potential. If Zubeldía manages to stay in charge and find a tactical balance, São Paulo could surprise and fight for a place in the Copa Libertadores. However, the trend is for the club to face an irregular season, with oscillations that could result in an average campaign in the Brasileirão. The board needs to act more efficiently to prevent the current climate of mistrust from becoming even more damaging.
| Starting XI | (3-4-2-1) Rafael; Ferraresi, Arboleda, Alan Franco; Cédric Soares, Alisson, Pablo Maia, Enzo Díaz; Lucas Moura, Oscar; Calleri. |
|---|---|
| Fun fact | São Paulo went 78 years without ever winning a three-peat. When they did, it was the Brasileirão: 2006, 2007 and 2008. At the time, before the unification of the tournaments held between 1959 and 1970, they were the first club to win the Brasileirão for three consecutive years. |
| Familiar face | Portugal’s Cédric Soares, of Arsenal fame, arrived at Tricolor Paulista at the start of the year on a controversial productivity contract. |
| Star of the show | After years in China, Oscar has returned to the club that raised him as a youth player and is proving to be well above the level of the national players. Good vision, well-timed passes and assists have been his calling cards at the start of the year. |
| Wild card | André Silva has been São Paulo’s reserve striker and has played a very important role to that of the starter, complementing the attacking actions with plenty of movement. |
| Sport |
|---|
| Full name | Sport Club do Recife |
|---|---|
| Nickname | Leão da Ilha (The Lion of the Island) |
| Stadium | Ilha do Retiro (32,500), Recife |
| 2023 Season | 3rd place (Brasileirão Série B) |
| Kits | Home - Away - Third |
| Best Campaign | Champions (1987) |
| Manager | Pepa |
Surely a Portuguese home
A Brasileirão returnee after a three-season absence, Sport are eager to reestablish themselves as a first-division mainstay, as they last were from 2014 to 2021 — missing on top-flight only once during that time. In an unprecedented period of prosperity for Brazilian Northeastern football, with a 20-club era-record five clubs hailing from the region, Fortaleza have achieved great recent sporting success and Bahia have spent great sums to reinforce their squad; Sport, with a claim to the largest number of supporters among clubs in the Brazilian Northeast, must find an answer to keep up and not be left behind.
Could Portuguese flair be it? In an ironic twist of fate, as Recife claims great Dutch heritage from their time under Dutch occupation and were one of Brazil’s most insurrectionist cities against colonial Portuguese rule, Sport are now surely a Portuguese home (com certeza uma casa portuguesa) under manager Pepa, who brought in from the Iberian country a strong and towering centre-back in João Silva, a midfielder with great passing in Sérgio Oliveira and a hardworking forward in Gonçalo Paciência.
Arriving midseason at Sport in 2024, Pepa helped Sport achieve a points-per-game average during his time there even greater than that of champions Santos’ overall campaign in the Brasileirão Série B and the team climbed from seventh place in the 25th round to third by the end of the league. These outstanding results, however, haven’t transferred so well into 2025 so far: while Sport are expected to beat Retrô to the Campeonato Pernambucano title, their Copa do Nordeste campaign hasn’t been as flattering, and a surprise first-round elimination in the Copa do Brasil hasn’t done the manager any favours. As the beginning of the Brasileirão approaches, Sport supporters wonder if the team’s Portuguese flair will be enough to at least avoid relegation.
| Starting XI | (4-2-3-1) Caíque França; Hereda, João Silva, Chico, Igor Cariús; Rivera, Sérgio Oliveira, Lucas Lima; Lenny Lobato, Gonçalo Paciência, Carlos Alberto. |
|---|---|
| Fun fact | Guilherme de Aquino Fonseca was introduced and came to love football as a college student in England, returning home to Recife with football equipment and red-and-black kits. His first intent was to create a football team at rowing club Náutico, where the idea didn’t take off. Guilherme went on to establish Sport, and Náutico became their biggest rivals when the they eventually started practising football. |
| Familiar face | Gonçalo Paciência, the former Porto, Eintracht Frankfurt, Schalke 04 and Celta de Vigo forward, and Sérgio Oliveira, the former Porto, Roma, Galatasaray and Olympiacos midfielder, are the best-known Sport players abroad. |
| Star of the show | Lucas Lima is an expert #10, with great playmaking skills, control of a match’s tempo and defence-splitting assists. |
| Wild card | Pablo joined Sport in 2025 after lengthy stints at Athletico Paranaense and São Paulo. Pablo is good on one-on-ones, drops deep and likes to finish or provide assists with quick thinking, being a shadow on Gonçalo Paciência’s place at the starting XI. |
| Vasco da Gama |
|---|
| Full name | Club de Regatas Vasco da Gama |
|---|---|
| Nickname | Gigante da Colina (Giant of the Hill), Vascão, Bacalhau (Cod) |
| Stadium | São Januário (21,880), Rio de Janeiro |
| 2024 Season | 10th place |
| Kits | Home - Away |
| Best Campaign | Champions (1974, 1989, 1997 and 2000) |
| Manager | Fábio Carille |
A melancholic ship without any admiral
If you were to see Vasco’s standings in the 2024 season, you could be led to believe that the team has the potential to reach greater heights. However, the club’s campaign last year can be described as a Cinderella story, alternating between bad, really bad and good stretches of results, while sacking three managers during the year. The start of the season was awkward even for the most pessimistic fans, with seven defeats in just ten games in the Brasileirão. At that point, it was unclear who would take over the club’s ownership, while the club had already dismissed two managers.
Then, U20 manager Rafael Paiva took over and surprisingly lifted the team to a mid-table position with unbeaten runs and also miraculously advancing through Copa do Brasil stages, relying heavily on penalty shootouts. However, as not all stories end well, a lack of depth at the flanks — due to the injuries affecting the squad — resulted in a nightmarish streak of defeats that once again haunted the supporters, and resulted in Paiva’s resignation.
Club de Regatas Vasco da Gama were originally founded as a rowing club (hence the “Regatas” in the name) by mostly Portuguese immigrants, and only in 1915 founded its department of football. Since then, the club has cultivated a mesmerizing reputation built on achievements on the social sphere.
In 1924, Vasco opposed the classist and racist rules in Rio football, which banned black players and labourers (who made up most of Vasco’s squad) from the Campeonato Carioca, claiming they were unfit and inadequate; then-club president José Augusto Prestes’s courageo…
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