VERY ATTENTION! FLAMENGO CAN APPROACH THE LEADER OF BRAZILIANO

On Thursday night (19), Flamengo hosted Peñarol at Maracanã for the first leg of the quarter-finals of the Copa Libertadores da América and came out with an unfavorable result. In front of more than 64 thousand fans, the team led by Tite had several opportunities, but failed to score.

The Uruguayan team took advantage of one of the few chances and, with a goal from Cabrera, secured a 1-0 victory. Now, Mengão will need to reverse the deficit in the second leg, scheduled for next Thursday- fair (26), in Montevideo.

This Thursday's defeat puts the Rio team in a delicate situation. To guarantee qualification to the semi-finals, Mais Querido will need to win by two goals at the Campeón del Siglo Stadium. A simple victory will take the decision to penalties, while any other score guarantees Peñarol's place. The result was even more painful for the club, as Flamengo has not lost at Maracanã in Libertadores competitions since 2019, also to Peñarol.

The return game is full of expectations, mainly due to the historic rivalry between the two teams in the South American competition. The winner of this duel will face, in the semifinals, the winner of the clash between Botafogo and São Paulo. On the other side of the bracket, there are River Plate (Argentina), Colo-Colo (Chile), Fluminense and Atlético-MG, which makes the path to the final even more competitive.

FLAMENGO AND PEÑAROL RETURN TO THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

Before the decisive match for the Libertadores, both teams have commitments for their national leagues. CRF travels to Porto Alegre to face Grêmio, next Sunday (22), at 6:30 pm, for the Brazilian Championship. Peñarol faces Cerro, also on Sunday, at 7pm, away from home, in the Clausura of the Uruguayan Championship.

Flamengo entered the field on Thursday night. With a packed Maracanã, Tite's men played the first match of the Libertadores quarter-finals against Peñarol (URU). The objective was to play a good game and take an advantage for the return game, next week. In this sense, the Rio team ended up disappointing the more than 60 thousand paying guests at the stadium and lost 1-0, in one of the team's worst matches of the year.

Summary

Peñarol It started well and Peñarol soon showed that it would play on the red and black error. Therefore, the Uruguayans opened the scoring after 12 minutes, with Cabrera, in a counterattack. Soon after, Flamengo responded with Plata's header hitting the post. But the red and black team had difficulty creating chances. In the final stretch of the first half, Flamengo grew and had great opportunities to draw. Bruno Henrique, alone, headed over goalkeeper Aguerre, who also made a great save from Arrascaeta's shot.

In the second half, Flamengo came back even better, but came up against the strong Uruguayan marking and the lack of creativity to reach the opponent's goal. Tite moved the sides, which gave Flamengo more speed, however, it had little effect due to a terrible night from Arrascaeta and De la Cruz. As a result, the result did not change and now Flamengo needs to reverse the situation away from home next week.

What now?

With the result, Flamengo will need to win by at least two goals to guarantee one of the places in the Libertadores semi-finals. The match takes place in Uruguay, next Thursday. However, Fla needs to turn the key, because there is a Brazilian Championship game to play on the weekend. Tite's men will face Grêmio, away from home, next Sunday, at 6:30 pm;

After the draw at Nilton Santos, John Textor, owner of SAF do Botafogo, spoke about the problems with Julio Casares, president of São Paulo. He defended that the two have a good relationship and also cited recent statements by Rodolfo Landim, Flamengo's president, who has criticized Alvinegro's high investments.

"I really appreciate that Julio [Casares] is here tonight. He was one of the first to welcome me to Brazil in a very good way. I know you are all reporting a lot of conversations about everything that happened last year, or maybe not happened, about fair play issues. It's important for people to understand that presidents can still be friends, they can be very civil with each other, they can advocate for their public policy views. As a friend, I would say it was great to see you here. We gave each other a big hug because we hadn't seen each other in a long time. In the Libra days, he was one of the people who welcomed me best."

"We are building an organization, a team. we are spending considerably less than what the fair play law says about 75% of our income on sales and player salaries. I think the Landimthe other day said that we needed to have rules because places like Brazil don't have these rules, if an investor comes and takes advantage of the fact that we don't have the rules. But we are in full agreement with all definitions of financial fair play around the world. I was the first to talk about it. I said if we don't do something about the salary cap and invite foreign investment, it will come from sovereign wealth nations with money and oil, then we really have a problem. I'm a lawyer for financial fair play."

Casares has already had fights with the owner of SAF do Glorioso amid accusations of match-fixing for the 2023 Brazilian Championship. The feud, however, remained in the background given the great repercussion of Textor's clashes with Leila Pereira, president of Palmeiras, the board of Tricolor São Paulo took action against the owner of SAF do Botafogo in several legal spheres.

In relation to. Landim, the president of Flamengo, has criticized Botafogo's high investment in several interviews. He argues that Brazil needs financial fair play to stop the money from SAFs.