São Paulo wins time and Crespo will be calm to meet the cast and build a team in Paulistão | Saint Paul

With fourth place in the Brazilian, São Paulo qualified for the group stage of the Libertadores and will only debut in the continental tournament in April, the first round is scheduled for the week of 21.

The situation would be different if he had to compete in the second phase of the competition, in which he would play a knockout on March 9 – and at the risk of suffering an early elimination at the beginning of the play.

+ See the complete table of the Paulista Championship

Thus, Crespo will have his full attention in the coming weeks at the Paulista, which starts on Sunday, with the duel against Botafogo-SP, in Morumbi, at 7pm.

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Due to the unusual 2020 season, affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, 2021 will start without preseason and just three days after the end of the Brazilian. Crespo followed the final stretch of the selection as an observer and just on Friday did his first field activity with the squad.

With the club in a difficult economic situation, he inherits a group of athletes with few changes: he has striker Bruno Rodrigues as reinforcement, but he lost defender Juanfran, who did not renew his contract.

This squad suffered in the final stretch of the Brazilian Championship, in which until the end of 2020 they led and were considered favorites, with seven points ahead of the sub-leader. In the last two months, however, there have only been two victories, in a crisis that overthrew former coach Fernando Diniz, took the team out of the fight for the cup and generated great suspicion in the Barra Funda CT.

Crespo will also see the return of players who were on loan, and at least two of them, Hudson and Shaylon, should receive more attention.

There is also the case of Rojas, who, due to knee injuries, spent the last two years in recovery and only returned to play on the Brazilian’s penultimate day. He will have Paulista’s contract extended until the end to have the opportunity to convince the coaching staff to stay.

The laboratory environment in Paulista is minimized, however, by the words of Crespo and the fasting of the club’s titles, which reaches its ninth edition:

– There are not many options. The pandemic left us tied up. The truth, the real situation has no preseason, or time. It seems to me that thinking about trying players in Paulistão doesn’t seem right to me, out of respect for Paulistão and São Paulo. São Paulo has to play to win the tournaments.

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With the debut of the Libertadores postponed until April, São Paulo will play almost the entire first phase of Paulista without having to share attention with another tournament. According to the current state table, only the last two rounds, scheduled for April 18 and 25, would collide with the Libertadores calendar, whose draw for the definition of groups will only take place on April 16.