São Paulo can face Botafogo by saving parts of the starting team

São Paulo’s next game marks the great possibility of the Brasileirão title for Botafogo, their opponent – but the São Paulo tricolor doesn’t seem too worried about that. Without fighting for anything in this Sunday’s match (8) at 4pm, São Paulo must spare its starters, going to Botafogo without its main team.

Until then, it would be in Zubeldía’s plans to spare Lucas Moura and other tired starters to face Nilton Santos in the last round of the Brazilian Championship. If Botafogo draws or wins the game, the title is defined. If they lose, Palmeiras could win if they win against Fluminense.

“For the match against Botafogo, we will have to see the situations. For example Lucas, who has been playing many times in a row, I need to see if he will be okay”, commented the black and white coach.

The decision to spare Lucas Moura would be justified by the 13 consecutive matches as a starter, since he did not enter the field against Cruzeiro, at Mineirão, on September 15th. All the team’s clashes on the front line have been played for almost three months.

In the tricolor’s last game, the absences were due to physical problems, such as pain in Calleri’s left thigh, Liziero’s right ankle, Ferraresi’s right knee, edema in Michel Araújo’s right calf, Ferreira’s left thigh , and tendinopathy in Wellington Rato’s right knee. None of them should take the field on Sunday for the same reasons.

“If we were fresh in our heads for important cases and also fresh physically, we could be a little less conservative with the players now at the end of the season, otherwise they will start the next season badly and then we will have nothing left”, commented Zubeldía.