Abel says Palmeiras close to their best, hails fighting spirit in win | OneFootball

Abel Ferreira praised the reaction of Palmeiras in the derby against São Paulo this Saturday at Arena Barueri, for the Campeonato Paulista. Verdão bounced back from the heavy defeat to Novorizontino and beat their rival 3-1.

The coach believes that the lineup used in the Choque-Rei is close to the ideal formation for the rest of the season. Additionally, he highlighted the team’s competitive spirit and recalled the tough loss in the last Paulistão match.

“Fall, learn, and get up stronger. Together in defeat and even stronger in victory. You said it was our best game, I think against Santos and Mirassol the team had already shown good dynamics. Today, with the team a bit closer to what could be the team of the future, more consistent. It was important to see everyone at the start of the season, to see these youngsters like Luis, Larson, Arthur. We took the opportunity to see some good surprises,” said the Portuguese coach.

“These lessons are good, because this jersey demands that training and competing is not a choice, it’s an obligation. Sometimes we have to take a few ‘slaps’, some disappointments, to realize that if we are as competitive as we were today. The best answer we could give would not be with gestures, with words, but with actions on the field. That’s what we did today. Our obligation is always to compete to win,” he added.

Duo on the Rise

Abel Ferreira also praised the midfield duo Marlon Freitas and Andreas Pereira. This was the first match the two started together for Palmeiras in 2026.

“We all knew Marlon, it was an opportunity after Aníbal was sold, a very well-made signing. He’s much more than a player, he’s someone who can lead, guide. He already had those characteristics at Botafogo. I did absolutely nothing except put him in to play. It’s great to have someone of that level,” he said.

“Unfortunately, we couldn’t count on Andreas in the last few games. We had to be prepared for that, we’ll have injuries throughout the season. If there’s more balance at the back, he can play as an 8 or a 10. Against River, Aníbal and Lucas played in the middle and he played as a right midfielder. It’s good to have a player who can do more than one or two positions, we’ll need that. It was the first time he played with Marlon, we hadn’t been able to do that before,” he concluded.

Standings Situation

With the win, Palmeiras sleeps at the top of the State Championship, with 12 points. Alviverde can still be overtaken by Red Bull Bragantino, who face Santos this Sunday at 4pm (Brasília time), at Neo Química Arena.

Palmeiras’ Next Match

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