Campeonato Brasileiro Série A

The Série A is the main division of Brazilian football. It is presently composed of 20 teams; currently, the bottom four teams in Série A are relegated and the top four teams in Série B are promoted.

Format

Historically, the championship was famous for being extremely disorganized, having its rules changed from season to season (and sometimes even during the middle of a season), mainly to prevent traditional clubs from being relegated (notably in 1993, 1996 and 2000) or because of lawsuits filed by clubs to prevent them being relegated (1997 and 2000). However, since 2003, the Série A has been disputed in a double round-robin format. In other words, each team plays against each other home and away, and the team with most points is declared champion. There is no final match, which is a very controversial subject. Prior to 2003, the Brazilian championship has traditionally been decided with some type of playoff format (most commonly the "Octagonal", where the top 8 regular season teams comprise a single elimination tournament), rather than the European model of points accumulated over a season. Although some purists complain that this system lacks the drama of playoffs and finals, the championship has so far shown to be well balanced, without the limited number of clubs dominating the league as found in many European leagues.

In 2005, each team played 42 games, 21 home and 21 away, for a total of 462 games. The champion and runner-up automatically qualified for the 2006 Copa Libertadores. The third and fourth placed teams may also represent Brazil in the Libertadores by defeating foreign clubs to be determined by CONMEBOL in pre-tournament trials. The champion and 5th through 11th placed teams also win the right to represent Brazil in the Copa Sudamericana, another South American championship of lower stature. The four last ranked teams (19th, 20th, 21st and 22nd) were relegated to the following year's Série B.

Eleven matches of the 2005 competition were annulled due to a match-fixing scandal and had to be replayed.

For the 2006 season, the number of contestants was reduced to 20, and CBF claims it to be the "definitive" format.

Teams currently playing Série A

Main article: Campeonato Brasileiro Série A 2007

These are the 20 teams playing Série A in 2007:

File:America natal football.png América de Natal (RN) Atlético Mineiro (MG) File:ParanaenseBrazilLogo.GIF Atlético Paranaense (PR) File:Botafogo football.png Botafogo (RJ) File:Corinthians simbolo.gif Corinthians (SP) File:Cruzeiro logo 2.gif Cruzeiro (MG) File:Figueirense.png Figueirense (SC) File:Flamengo logo football.png Flamengo (RJ) File:Logo fluminense.jpg Fluminense (RJ) File:Goias football.png Goiás (GO)

Grêmio (RS) File:SC internacional.GIF Internacional (RS) File:Juventude logo.png Juventude (RS) File:Náutico.gif Náutico (PE) File:Palmeiras Symbol.png Palmeiras (SP) File:Parana.gif Paraná (PR) File:SantosBrazilLogo.GIF Santos (SP) File:Sao Paulo (Soccer) Shield.gif São Paulo (SP) File:Sport recife.png Sport (PE) File:Vasco-da-gama.png Vasco da Gama (RJ)

Champions of Série A

Year	Winner		Runner-up	Comments	Entrants
1971 Details				Three-team final stage. Botafogo eventually finished third.	20
Year	Winner	Score	Runner-up	Comments	Entrants
1972 Details		0 - 0	Template:Botafogo de Futebol e Regatas	Palmeiras declared champions due to better season record	26
Year	Winner		Runner-up	Comments	Entrants
1973 Details				Four-team final stage. Palmeiras drawed São Paulo 0-0 on last stage match	40
Year	Winner	Score	Runner-up	Comments	Entrants
1974 Details		2 - 1	Template:Cruzeiro Esporte Clube	Four-team final stage. Extra tie-break match	40
1975 Details		1 - 0	Template:Cruzeiro Esporte Clube		46
1976 Details		2 - 0			54
1977 Details		0 - 0		São Paulo won 3-2 on penalties.	60
1978 Details		1 - 0 1 - 0			74
1979 Details		2 - 0 2 - 1		Internacional became champions without losing one single game, a deed yet unmatched.	96
1980 Details		0 - 1 3 - 2			104
1981 Details	Template:Grêmio de Foot-Ball Porto-Alegrense	2 - 1 1 - 0			88
1982 Details		1 - 1 0 - 0 1 - 0	Template:Grêmio de Foot-Ball Porto-Alegrense		88
1983 Details		1 - 2 3 - 0			88
1984 Details	Template:Fluminense Football Club	1 - 0 0 - 0			72
1985 Details		1 - 1	Template:Bangu Atlético Clube	Coritiba won 6-5 on penalties.	40
1986 Details		1 - 1 3 - 3		São Paulo won 4-3 on penalties.	80
1987(1) Details		1 - 1 1 - 0		Four-team final stage turned home-and-away playoff	32
1988 Details	Template:Esporte Clube Bahia	2 - 1 0 - 0			24
1989 Details		1 - 0		Second final-series match unnecessary as Vasco had a better season record and won the away match	22
1990 Details		1 - 0 1 - 0			20
1991 Details		1 - 0 0 - 0	Template:Clube Atlético Bragantino		20
1992 Details		3 - 0 2 - 2	Template:Botafogo de Futebol e Regatas		20
1993 Details		1 - 0 2 - 0	Template:Esporte Clube Vitória		32
1994 Details		3 - 1 1 - 1			24
1995 Details	Template:Botafogo de Futebol e Regatas	2 - 1 1 - 1	||	24
1996 Details	Template:Grêmio de Foot-Ball Porto-Alegrense	0 - 2 2 - 0		Grêmio declared champions due to better season record.	24
1997 Details		0 - 0 0 - 0		Vasco da Gama declared champions due to better season record	26
1998 Details		2 - 2 1 - 1 2 - 0	Template:Cruzeiro Esporte Clube		24
1999 Details		2 - 3 2 - 0 0 - 0			22
2000(2) Details		1 - 1 3 - 1	Template:Associação Desportiva São Caetano	Organized by Clube dos 13 on CBF's behalf, and dubbed Copa João Havelange	116
2001 Details	Template:Clube Atlético Paranaense	4 - 2 1 - 0	Template:Associação Desportiva São Caetano		28
2002 Details		2 - 0 3 - 2			26
Year	Winner		Runner-up	Comments	Entrants
2003 Details	Template:Cruzeiro Esporte Clube 100 pts / 46 matches		87 pts / 46 matches	From 2003 onwards, regular season + play-offs system was substituted by full round-robin season	24
2004 Details	89 pts / 46 matches		Template:Clube Atlético Paranaense 86 pts / 46 matches		24
2005 Details	81 pts / 42 matches		78 pts / 42 matches	A refereeing scandal led to refixturing of matches which otherwise would have given Internacional the title	22
2006 Details	78 pts / 38 matches		69 pts / 38 matches		20

Titles by team

• 4 titles: Corinthians, Flamengo ⁽¹⁾, Palmeiras, São Paulo, Vasco da Gama⁽²⁾
• 3 titles: Internacional
• 2 titles: Grêmio, Santos
• 1 title: Atlético Mineiro, Atlético Paranaense, Bahia, Botafogo, Coritiba, Cruzeiro, Fluminense, Guarani, Sport⁽¹⁾

Titles by state

• São Paulo 15 titles
• Rio de Janeiro 10 titles^{(1) (2)}
• Rio Grande do Sul 5 titles
• Minas Gerais 2 titles
• File:Parana.jpg Paraná 2 titles
• Bahia 1 title
• Pernambuco 1 title⁽¹⁾

¹The championship of 1987 was controversial as CBF faced scission from Clube dos 13 which decided to organize the 1987 premiership on its own. The latter, dubbed Copa União, had Flamengo and Internacional as champion and runner-up. Despite signing an agreement with CBF in order avoid being banned by FIFA, both teams backed by Clube dos 13 decided not to match their title with CBF's tournament winners in order to unify the title.

² The championship was not organised by CBF because Gama, in the 1999 championship, contested and won in a common justice court and reverted its relegation. CBF was thus legally impeached of organizing it and asked Clube dos 13 to act as a proxy while backing the competition. The rules reproduced roughly previous tournaments with a regular season and play-offs, though all teams legally had to be able to dispute, thus 1999 clubs were not relegated. After Gama withdrew its protests in the common justice, the team was included in the championship.

Trivia

• In 1974,teams claimed that "the supporters only go to the stadium in the finals" and a knockout stage with the top 4 clubs was instated.
• In 1999, an averaging relegation system similar to the one used in the Primera División Argentina was adopted. The two clubs with the worst point results in the first stage of the two previous seasons were to be relegated. However, this system only lasted for a single season.
• The seasons with more entrants were: 2000 (116 entrants), 1979 (94 entrants) and 1986 (80 entrants).
• In 2006, for the first time, a limit on the number of foreign players was imposed. No team can have more than 3 foreign players on the field or on the bench in a single match.
• The only club to win a championship undefeated was Internacional, in 1979, with 15 wins and 7 draws.
• Roberto Dinamite is the player with most goals scored in Campeonato Brasileiro history. Dinamite scored 190 in 20 seasons (1971-1989).
• As of 2006, only Cruzeiro, Flamengo, Internacional and Vasco da Gama participated in all editions of the Série A.
• The 2006 season has seen some players wearing strange numbers on their shirts. Until early August, Flamengo's Luizão was wearing the 111 shirt. Goiás' goalkeeper Harley wore the 400 shirt, celebrating the number of matches he played for that team. Fixed numbering is not a common practice in Brazilian football, but clubs like São Paulo, Cruzeiro and Corinthians adopt it.
• All the big clubs from São Paulo, except Palmeiras withdrew from the 1979 championship, alleging it had too many teams. The championship had 94 entrants that year. They were not removed from 1980's Série A.
• In a match between Goiás and Cruzeiro, in 1979, 14 players were sent off.

External links

• CBF Confederação Brasileira de Futebol - Brazilian Football Confederation
• RSSSF Brazil links