Opinion

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Rubbish Recife

When Sport Recife were promoted from Serie B last year they will have had high hopes of staying in the top flight. After spending three seasons back in the second tier, it was a chance to get back on track and move forward. Unfortunately it has been anything but a smooth return to the top table of Brazilian football for Leao da llha.

It took Recife until August to get their first win on the board, that was sixteen games into the new season. That win over Gremio put them on nine points. In the seventeen games that have followed that win, Recife have only added eight points to that total, and relegation has now been confirmed for the lads in red and black. They are also dead on to finish bottom of the pile, a position that they have held pretty much from the off this season.

Out of all of the teams that came up last season, Í actually thought Recife would do the best of the four of them. Of course that prediction was way off the mark and although Santos are down near the bottom, they are making a good fist of survival and currently sit in 16th, one point above the relegation zone with four games to play. Ceara are mid table and looking safe, and then there is Mirrasol who continue to shock and delight in equal measure, sitting incredibly in 4th position – but for Recife, this miserable season will soon be at an end, and not a moment to soon.

The current run of seven straight defeats is their worst of the season so far and this terrible run saw yet another change in manager. Daniel Paulista was replaced with the familiar face of Cesar Lucena to see out the remaining games of the season. It is Cesar’s seventh spell as interim boss, but the former centre back won’t be staging any great escape this time and most likely won’t be in the running for the job on a full time basis going into the 2026 Serie B term.

It has been such a poor season and all they can do is regroup and try and bounce back at the first time of asking but one thing is for sure they need a stable environment to work in because changing the manager four times in one season is definitely not the way to go if you want to be successful as a club.