São Paulo flirt with danger, reinvent themselves, deserve more | OneFootball

By Thais Bueno

São Paulo lost to Cruzeiro last Saturday by 1 to 0, at Mineirão, for the 22nd round of the Brazilian Championship. The result was not as expected, of course, but above all, Tricolor showed that it knows how to play football. Even with ten absences, Hernán Crespo's team maintained its identity and only left with a loss due to a tremendous 'bad luck'.

The Argentine coach had, in total, ten absences. Calleri, Lucas, Oscar, Arboleda, Alisson, Marcos Antônio, André Silva, Ryan Francisco and Luiz Gustavo are handed over to the medical department, while Enzo Díaz had to serve a suspension for the accumulation of yellow cards.

São Paulo had more ball possession in the first minutes of the match and controlled the actions of the game. Tricolor filled Cruzeiro's attack field more and even took advantage of some errors in the Fox's ball exit. The São Paulo team almost opened the score in a blunder by Cássio, who lost to Luciano in the small area.

Rodriguinho was one of the main characters of São Paulo in this more offensive start. With freedom to float between midfield and attack, he recovered important balls and distributed the team's game. It was 15 minutes of a Tricolor that imposed itself, especially in duels and recoveries, and found some spaces in Cruzeiro's defense.

The confrontation was very disputed in the midfield, with São Paulo getting the better in most of the clashes. Even so, it was not a game with many chances created. Tricolor's best opportunities came from Rodriguinho's feet, quite participative. From the final minutes, however, the São Paulo team began to suffer a little more defensively and made silly mistakes, leaving a lot of space for outside shots and making wrong ball exits.

What drew the most attention in the first half was São Paulo's posture, tactical discipline and organization. It was not a brilliant first half, it is true, but the team suffered little against one of the best teams in the tournament. Raposa only shot four times in the first half, all from outside the area. Tricolor's strategy worked: the defense did not let Matheus Pereira and Kaio Jorge play, and the attack got excited in some chances.

São Paulo returned for the second half with the same imposition of the first half: it had more of the ball, rotated the game well and almost opened the scoring with a shot from Rodriguinho. From the 10th minute, however, Cruzeiro began to get closer, confusing the marking and bringing more danger to the tricolor goal.

At 18 minutes, however, São Paulo was unlucky and fell behind on the scoreboard. Despite being better in the match, Tricolor saw a ball to decide the result. Matheus Pereira took a free kick from the entrance of the area. The ball deflected off Alan Franco's head and ended any chance of Rafael's defense.

Thus, the São Paulo team had to chase the draw, but stopped at the little approach of its main players. Cruzeiro, on the other hand, took advantage of São Paulo's slower pace and began to pile up chances, especially in aerial ball plays. At 31 minutes, for example, Rafael made two saves in a row and saved the team.

Crespo sought alternatives to try for the draw and moved the team: he changed the attacking duo for Dinenno and Tapia, in addition to taking Pablo Maia to put the boy Henrique Carmo. Tricolor even came close to drawing with a header from the Argentine, but Cássio made a good save and prevented the goal. São Paulo, thus, gave 'soup to bad luck' and left defeated from Belo Horizonte.

With the result, São Paulo's streak of eight unbeaten games (six wins and two draws) in the Brasileirão was ended. The São Paulo Tricolor remains in seventh place, with 32 points, and lost the chance to, at least, sleep in the G6.

Despite the frustrating defeat, São Paulo played a good game in Belo Horizonte and deserved to have taken at least one point from Mineirão. The certainty that remains is that Hernán Crespo's work is being well done and tends to improve even more when the coach has all the players available.

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This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇧🇷 here.