Flamengo staged a sensational late recovery to come from behind and win 2-1 against Fortaleza on Wednesday evening. Two goals in the final seven minutes of normal time gave Jorge Jesus’ side their fourth straight league victory and maintained their 8-point lead at the top of the Campeonato Brasileiro Série A.
The winning goal in Fortaleza was scored by 17-year-old wonderkid Reinier, with Flamengo’s refusal to release the youngster to the Brazil U17 team validated in the eyes of Mengão’s Portuguese boss. Meanwhile, Jesus says he has no intention of resting players in the midst of a hectic schedule in which the Rio de Janeiro club fight on two fronts.
Flamengo fell behind on the hour in Ceará against a Fortaleza side which had won their previous two home matches. A penalty awarded for handball allowed Bruno Melo to open the scoring for the hosts, but the decision was levelled out when Flamengo gained a spot-kick for the same offence and top marksman Gabriel Barbosa made it 1-1 on 83 minutes.
With the match seemingly headed for a draw, 17-year-old Reinier scored the most important goal since his introduction to the senior side by Jesus earlier this season. In snatching a 90th-minute winner, the midfielder vindicated a decision by Flamengo to refuse his release for the Brazilian under-17 team last week.
"The decision regarding Reinier was proven to be super right,” Jesus said. “It was he who changed the result. This shows the opinions that Flamengo's management had were right. We have injured and suspended players and he was important. It was important to have him today so congratulations to the club for that."
“We won because we believed”
Speaking on the match itself, the former Benfica boss admitted his side were not at their best. "We didn't play to the level we are used to in the first half. We made tactical changes in the first half to see if we could improve the team but it didn’t work. At the break we changed some things and it got a little better. After the equaliser we played our best. It was a win with a bit of luck. The champions also need to be lucky.
“We ended up winning because we believed we could win. But you may think our second goal was by chance, but it wasn't. I don't want to talk about it so as not to give clues to others. It was teamwork. We didn’t have the usual performance because we didn't have some players, the grass was long, but we were losing and we came back. We didn't win with a VAR decision. We got our equaliser with VAR decision and suffered a VAR decision to go 1-0 down.
"Flamengo players and fans deserve it because they believed it to the end and today was a victory with a little luck of champions."
The evening was almost a decisive one in the title race as second-place Palmeiras looked set to be headed for a goalless draw with Chapecoense, which would have seen Flamengo's lead at the top increase to ten points. However, Felipe Melo's goal in the 9th minute of stoppage time gave the defending champions a narrow win and kept their hopes of closing the gap alive.
The fixtures keep on coming for Jesus’ side, with a highly-anticipated local derby with fierce rivals Fluminense on Sunday followed by the second leg of the Copa Libertadores semi-final with Grêmio. With the cup tie delicately poised at 1-1, some may anticipate the veteran Portuguese resting players at the weekend, but Jesus refutes such notions.
“What is this about resting? Rest? That does not exist. This is not my culture. Let's rest on the days we have available. Thursday, Friday, Saturday ... Sunday is for running. If there are players with signs of injury risk, then that's different.”
By Sean Gillen
