LION GOALS
In an interview with CORREIO, president of Leão spoke about the club’s planning for next season
Published on December 21, 2024 at 02:00
Fábio Mota talks about re-election and outlines plans for 2025 Credit: Marina Silva/CORREIO
A Barradão with improvements in infrastructure, a squad capable of keeping Vitória back in the first division and winning the Copa Sudamericana are some of the objectives that the club’s president, Fábio Mota, has for 2025. The season, in fact, could be the leader’s last in office – despite confessing that he has not yet decided on the decision. The president spoke to CORREIO and spoke about Leão’s planning for next year. Check it out:
Vitória managed to qualify for the Copa Sudamericana in the penultimate round of Series A. What are the club’s expectations for competing in this new international calendar?
R: It’s going to be a challenging season, the result of a lot of work and the achievements we manage to achieve and, every hour, the bar goes up. For the first time, we will compete in a South American championship. Before, it was knockout and, this time, we will compete for a championship. We have already entered the group stage, we will have six games in the first phase. This is important for the institution, it is the international calendar that I have always dreamed of since I arrived, it will take Vitória’s brand to South America and will strengthen the club. All of this is challenging, because it is our second consecutive year in Serie A after the return and we are aiming for bigger things, so we are making an effort to have a much bigger squad, there are many competitions.
What are the differences between today’s Fábio Mota and the one who took over in October 2021? What did you learn during your time as president of Vitória?
R: It changed a lot in every way, I gave myself over to Vitória. I have always been a manager in both my personal life and a public manager for almost 20 years and football is very different. One of the problems we have and that I found in Vitória is the institution’s lack of credibility. Taking over an institution that owed R$400 million with unhealthy structural conditions is very difficult. It was a war operation. We put together a team, we looked for sponsors to help us and you learn how to mature in football every year. Fábio Mota, who took over on an interim basis in 2021 for Fábio almost three years later, matured, gained football experience and learned that life is an eternal learning experience. I made a lot of mistakes and got some things right. I think I got more things right than I got wrong and I’m always striving for perfection. I think change makes human beings great.
What does president Fábio Mota want to deliver to Vitória fans in 2025?
R: I aim to deliver the club’s new parking lot, which we will deliver on January 11th with an additional 2,500 spaces. I want to deliver the new CT with three football fields, three buildings, two more football fields for the base and a specific field for women, as if it were a mini stadium. We will have accommodation for women, a gym for women, an administrative building, etc. I hope to deliver all of this during the year 2025. In the sports area, I aim to achieve an unprecedented title, which would be the Copa Sudamericana title. It would be the first time that a club in the northeast would be champion of the South American Championship. Obviously we have other priorities and the main one is to first remain in Series A. Secondly, seek a place in the Libertadores.
Vitória’s average attendance has been increasing since Serie C. How important is this movement to rebuild the red and black fans for the club?
R: The fans are fundamental to everything that happened. Vitória reached rock bottom. This is not to belittle, but it was going to become a club without a division, like Santa Cruz and Paraná are today due to the tragic administrations that took place. There were seven presidents in seven years and, when there is discontinuity, it is very complicated. It’s difficult with continuity, imagine without. Vitória surpassed itself greatly due to the arrival of fans, we had games with an average of 4,000 people during these six years. Nobody wanted to play here, because Vitória didn’t pay anyone, the supplier didn’t want to supply… We put together a plan to transform and rebuild the club and we’ve been achieving this year after year. It was the most difficult task I have encountered in my life. Without the fans, we continued in Series C of the Brazilian Championship. The fans believed and embraced the project, we went from four thousand members in October 2021, when I took over the club, to 41 thousand in October 2024. The fundamental thing in all of this was the support of the fans. And when I say fans, it’s not just at the stadium. Vitória sold R$200,000 worth of products in the only store it had and now we sell R$20 million a year in the seven stores.
The Lion market sector has undergone recent changes. How does this new board configuration work?
R: Vitória had a very small performance analysis department, two people with just one computer. We invest in and hire the best football monitoring and performance platforms today, we have what the biggest clubs in the world have. We also changed the configuration of our football board, where we only had the football director to do everything. Not anymore today. We also hired Head Scout, who are the coordinators of the two departments, the performance analysis department, with the function of analyzing Vitória and the next opponents, and the market department, which monitors all competitions in Brazil and South America. You have an analyst who monitors Series C, one with Series B and another for Series A, in addition to the three monitoring Brazilian players who are outside the country and in South America. It all starts at the beginning of the year, the signings that are happening are not fruits of now, but of a work from a trainer-independent database. Vitória has player data stored and is always updated.
With Conmebol’s determination, the Barradão fence will need to be removed. What is the deadline for installing the new acrylic and how much will the work cost the club?
R: The fence will come off, but in stages. To remove it at once, the stadium would have to be closed. Barradão has been one of the club’s main allies throughout Vitória’s history, so let’s change. In fact, we have already paid 50% of the fences. It will be done in stages, first goal back, sides, etc. Our idea is to have all the acrylic installed until the Sul-Americana. We also need to implement LED lighting in Barradão and the idea is that, in the first half of the year, we can change it. There are two high costs, the fence will cost more than R$1 million and the lighting for the entire structure will cost more than R$3 million. We are studying the same platform that Corinthians used to pay its debt, which is immensely larger than ours at Caixa Econômica Federal. We will do this and also hope for the supporter’s contribution to help us with these much-needed reforms.
Renovations are currently being carried out to replace the Barradão lawn. Vitória’s idea is to return with the club’s badge next to the field?
R: We are changing 40% of the grass in Barradão, because we have the grass that was implemented since the World Cup and, due to lack of maintenance over the long years that have passed, this grass has been compromised by the Esmeralda grass, which is a predator. We bought one from São Paulo to replace everything that is not the original from Brazil as a whole. When finished, the Barradão field will return to the same place it was before, we will move four meters towards the administration buildings and, in this space, which will open, we have the idea of building the Vitória shield that the entire fans asked for it and it was a hallmark of the stadium.
With a possible non-reelection, is there any project that the president believes it will not be possible to deliver in the remaining time of his term?
R: The gym and the museum are two projects that I have, but I don’t think I’ll be able to do them in another year, it doesn’t just depend on Vitória. We have the gym area defined, the project is almost ready and we need federal resources to do it. We spoke with the Government, with parliamentarians and the idea is to seek amendments for the construction. The museum is a very important thing that Vitória urgently needs to have. We have also completed the project and are seeking financing for the work, through the Culture Incentive Law. The museum will be located within the Academia do Leão area. These are projects that we will work hard to get ready and well underway if I decide not to be a candidate for re-election.
