Machiavellian managerial madness | OneFootball

Loyalty, respect and decency are in short supply.

Brazil’s managerial merry-go-round has spun again, with three teams changing their coaches with just three games left to play.

The names in question are Cruzeiro, CSA and Ceara, who are all fighting with each other to avoid relegation. The coaches involved are Abel Braga, Adilson Batista and the appropriately-named Argel Fucks.

It is a high-risk move changing coach with three games left to play but for once, it was not only the clubs that were responsible for the swithes; in some cases it was the managers themselves. Two of those managers went from went from one team involved in a relegation battle to another team involved in the same relegation battle with three games left to play.

It started on Wednesday night after Ceara had lost 4-1 to Flamengo, a result that prompted Ceara to fire their coach Adilson Batista. And it then kicked off big time after Argel Fuck’s CSA beat Cruzeiro on Thursday night. That result moved CSA onto 32 points, four points behind Cruzeiro, who remained in the relegation zone on 36 points, one point from safety. Ceara are on 37 points. You couldn’t make this stuff up.

The result was a disaster for Cruzeiro and their coach Abel Braga offered his resignation after the game, which was duly accepted. This prompted Cruzeiro to look for an alternative, which the recently-fired Adilson Batista was happy to accept.

You’ve got to question Batista’s decision to accept the offer. Yes, you are unemployed and Cruzeiro are a big club; but moving to a team where your goal is to relegate the players and fans that you were representing just two days ago, is not cool. Adilson’s reasoning was that you don’t turn down a move to Cruzeiro when a club of that size come calling.

He also said that he wants his team to play with the pace and intensity of an English Premier League team. Good luck with that when you’ve got Fred as your main striker. Perhaps he was referring to the way that Big Sam and Tony Pulis teams play.

If you thought that was bad, Fucks was more than happy to accept the managerial position at Ceara and he informed CSA of this straight after his team’s win against Cruzeiro. He quite candidately said that his contract with CSA didn’t prevent him from leaving when he wanted, and he didn’t see any problem in abandoning CSA straight after giving them a glimmer of hope of survival hope by beating Cruzeiro.

It seems that no rules were broken but it raises some serious ethical questions, since Fucks must have agreed to represent Ceara before his took his CSA side to the field against Cruzeiro. I like Ceara and wish them the best, but I would enjoy seeing the look on Fuck’s face if they go down.

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