Game of the Week: Vasco 1×1 Universidad de Chile

The Copa Sul-Americana (or Sudamericana in the Spanish-speaking majority of South America) is a rather odd tournament. It is highly under-valued all over the continent, but particularly in Brazil, where the midweek games at key points in the tournaments are seen as little more than unwelcome distractions. For example this year, when São Paulo, Botafogo and Flamengo were eliminated in the space of 24 hours at the last-16 stage, there was some immediate surprise, but it was very quickly forgotten.

Think of it as the South American version of the Europa League, but with considerably longer travel times.

The tournament got a little boost in the past few years after CONMEBOL decided to award an extremely valuable place to the following year’s Copa Libertadores group stage. As a result, a number of the continent’s ‘lesser’ sides shifted their focus towards the Copa Sul-Americana and away from their own tough domestic campaign, in search of an ‘easy’ route into the Copa Libertadores.

However a close look at this year’s semi-finalists reveals an intriguing anomaly. All four of the teams still alive in the competition are already guaranteed (or almost guaranteed in Liga de Quito’s case) qualification to the 2012 Copa Libertadores through their own respective domestic successes. Does this mean the Copa Sul-Americana is becoming more and more important to South America’s big guns? Quite possibly.

New Mirror Football post

Just a little reminder that my most recent post on the Mirror Football website was published today, a little look at the crazily competitive season we have had in the Brasileirão, with a mind-blowing stat to back it up.

You can find the post here, have a read, and if you have any opinions or anything you’d like to discuss, drop me a comment on the site, or here at the end of this post.

I’ll be back in mid-week (probably Thursday, Wednesday is a national holiday) with the Game of the Week from this weekend, and I will also have another Twenty to Watch profile going up. Stay tuned.

Game of the Week: Santos 2×0 Vasco

Upon choosing which game to feature in this Game of the Week section, I am more often than not left with a tricky decision. Each week I intend to cover the most ‘significant’ match, but with so many exciting games going on, naturally some decent candidates get ignored. What I prefer to do with these weekly articles is to cover a particular team(s)’s system, and to do so in a match which showcases the qualities and/or flaws of said system. The best examples of that are from October 15th when I covered Atlético Goianiense in their demolition of São Paulo, and just last week when I took a close look at Grêmio in their 4×2 victory over Flamengo. Following on in that style this week, I decided to study Santos’ home win against Vasco, and to delve in to the inner tactical workings of the 2011 Copa Libertadores champions.

Game of the Week: Grêmio 4×2 Flamengo

As many will be aware of, Sunday’s match between Grêmio and Flamengo was not just a clash of two of Brazil’s titanic clubs, but it was also the homecoming of a particularly recognisable buck-toothed gaúcho.

In January of this year, it was announced that Ronaldinho Gaúcho would be coming home to Brazil after ten glorious years in Europe. With his rather unscrupulous brother-cum-agent Assis (you may know him better as A$$i$) in tow, Ronaldinho packed his bags and embarked on a whistle-stop tour around Brazil, lunching with directors of the country’s biggest sides. After the initial commotion, three clubs emerged as potential suitors, Palmeiras, Flamengo, and Grêmio. Ronaldinho revealed that Palmeiras had made him the best contract offer, and that Flamengo were also offering plenty of cash, but if it was up to him, he would sign for his boyhood heroes Grêmio.