Opinion – Sandro Macedo: The math of the Brazilian’s second round begins

The second half of the Brazilian Championship starts full of auspicious news for Palmeiras.

For starters, from the series “there are evils that come only to harm well”, thanks to the VAR of the game against São Paulo for the Copa do Brasil, the team had an entire week free in relation to the main competitors for the national title – but Fluminense will have the same privilege next week.

Abel Ferreira won’t even know what to do with so much free time for the team that has been on the field the most this year — I recommend a marathon with the “All or Nothing” series on streaming, with José Mourinho’s Tottenham; ended up in “nothing”, but it’s fun.

For those who love to mix superstition with coincidence, last year’s champion debuted in the Brazilian Championship losing at home to a team from Ceará (Atlético Mineiro 1 x 2 Fortaleza); this year, Palmeiras lost 3-2 at Allianz Parque to Ceará in round 1.

The table has been more tangled up, but after the last two rounds it got a little spread out. With 39 points, Palmeiras has 4 against Corinthians; 5 for Fluminense; and 7 and 9, respectively, for the feared Atlético Mineiro and Flamengo — this scribe does not believe that Athletico-PR will have the strength to be the champion, but he believes that Scolari’s team will be able to do better in the cups (Libertadores or Brazil) .

If Palmeiras repeats the same 39 points in the return, they will only lose the title if the nearest rival scores at least 43 points – and discount the goal difference. In 2021, Atlético Mineiro scored 42 points in each round to close the championship with 84.

In other words, for a team to be champion, it has to do more than Atlético Mineiro did in last year’s return, or it will need to count on a drop in the leader’s performance. Right now, it doesn’t look like the first thing is going to happen… or the second.

Jorge Jesus’ intrepid Flamengo scored an incredible 48 points in the 2019 return, 9 points more than alviverde in the first round of this year. Interestingly, Palmeiras has a 9-point advantage over the rubro-negro. Therefore, the team from Rio needs a second round à la Jesus to reach the title.

With 78 points in both rounds (39+39), Palmeiras would be a much better champion than Flamengo in 2020 (71 points), but much worse than the legendary Flamengo in 2019 (90), and would also be behind Palmeiras de 2018 (80), which doesn’t matter at all for mathematicians from Palmeiras.

Attention, the referees of the Flamengo x Athetico-PR VAR cabin disappeared, or they had food poisoning and ended up in the sanitary VAR; or were abducted. Only one of these options would explain the catastrophic omission in Wednesday’s game at Maracanã. If you come across any of them, call CBF, Seneme branch.

At this window, we believe that the best solution for Brazilian arbitration is to immediately deliver the electronic review to the Central do Apito of Globo channels — it is always good to remember that this column contains irony.

Round 38 – Update

With the second round starting this weekend, not many survivors. After the recent dismissals of Argentine brothers Antonio “Turco” Mohamed, from Atlético Mineiro, and Fabián Bustos, from Santos, we now have nine coaches alive since round 1, with 19 more rounds to go. The survivors are: 5 foreigners (3 Portuguese, 1 Argentinian and 1 Paraguayan) and 4 Brazilians (counting Dorival Jr., who changed toys, but did not lose any rounds).