Champion before playing, Palmeiras reaches his Brazilian title with greater ease

It was so easy that Palmeiras didn’t even have to play to celebrate the 2022 Brazilian Championship title. calm, with vast superiority over opponents.

None of his ten previous trophies in the competition – including the triumphs in the Brazil Cup and the Roberto Gomes Pedrosa Tournament – ​​has been lifted with such ease. The eight victories until 1994 were achieved in finals or in decisive fours. There were previous situations of clear superiority, but confirmation only came at the end of the dispute.

Since the tournament was held in the straight points format, the club has won it on three occasions, this time with a more comfortable advantage. In 2016 and 2018, the team celebrated with two rounds of anticipation and ended the campaign with 80 points, respectively nine and eight ahead of the runner-up.

Now, with 74 points, he still has 12 to play for (Inter, who tied with América-MG in Belo Horizonte, can only reach 73), three of them on Wednesday night, against Fortaleza. This time, at least so far, there were fewer defeats, just two. In 2016, there were six matches without points; in 2018, four.

The recent results only confirmed what was designed since the initial phase of the championship. Palmeiras started their campaign losing at home to Ceará, but soon recovered and took the lead for the first time in the eighth round. The position was taken for good in the tenth, and Abel Ferreira’s team never looked back.

There have been 21 wins and 11 draws so far, in addition to the aforementioned two defeats. With 59 goals scored, the team has the best attack in the competition. With 22 suffered, it is the least leaked. And, if it is not surpassed by Cuiabá in Cuiabá and Internacional in Porto Alegre, it will be the first in the era of straight points to conclude the dispute without any setback as a visitor.

“These players are making history at the club,” said Abel. “I don’t know if we have the best coach or the best squad, but we want to be and improve. Collectively, we are very strong. In the Brazilian, it’s about being consistent, playing the same way away or at home. It has a lot to do with the character of our team. players. We don’t have the best players, but we do have men of character.”

Signed in 2020, the Portuguese quickly became a historic figure for the club, winning two editions of the Copa Libertadores (2020 and 2021), one of the Copa do Brasil (2020), one of the Recopa Sul-Americana (2022) and one of the Campeonato Paulista. (2022). The Brazilian Championship was missing. No more.

Ferreira admitted frustration with the falls recorded in the season. According to him, the defeats to São Paulo, in the round of 16 of the Copa do Brasil, and to Athletico Paranaense, in the semifinals of Libertadores, were “stuck”. But the green team, which was also frustrated at the beginning of the year in the World Cup, knew how to recover to take the Brazilian for the 11th time.

The achievement, which was already very well underway, was even closer in the 33rd round, with a 3-0 victory over Avaí applauded by the (also applauded) President of the Republic, Jair Bolsonaro (PL), at Allianz Parque. Then, another triumph: 3-1 over Athletico, a celebration of the present and the future.

Striker Endrick, 16, scored his first goal as a professional and became the youngest ever to hit the net with the Palmeiras shirt. In another bid that ended in celebration, he kicked the ball along with midfielder Gustavo Scarpa, 28, protagonist in the conquest and departure for England football.

There was still the (merely) mathematical possibility that the team could be reached in the table, extinguished on Wednesday afternoon. Internacional lost by 1 to 0 América-MG, in Belo Horizonte, Alê’s goal, and Palmeiras x Fortaleza of the night became, for the alviverde side, just a day of celebration.

Thus, the club that a decade ago was relegated in advance and dropped for the second time to Serie B, is now anticipated champion of Serie A. A lot has changed in the last ten years for the club, which was close to relegation again in 2014 and after that, he started a sequence of glories.

With the financial support of the credit company Crefisa – whose president, Leila Pereira, is now also president of the club itself – and a structural reorganization, the trophies began to be erected. Champion of the Copa do Brasil in 2015, the Brazilian in 2016 and 2018 and the Paulista in 2020, the team took off once and for all with the arrival of Abel Ferreira.