Palmeiras vs Avai – Brazilian A 

A meeting were Palmeiras will try to stop the bad beat of games at home, where in 10 matches they got only 3 wins, tied 3 and lost 4. The paulist team comes with good moral, resulting from their recent matches. They haven0t been beaten for 4 matches, with 3 wins and a tie.

Palmeiras is 9th in the League with 39 points in 27 games, and the goal for Libertadores 2011 is very far, so now the main goal is to gather more points to climb in the table and maintain their presence in the South American Cup next year. Against Ceará, Scolari’s coached team won’t be able to count on their goalkeeper Marcos, injured, as well as Ewerthon. Tinga is also injured, and Danilo is suspended.

Palmeiras: Deola, Vitor, Maurício Ramos, Fabrício and Gabriel Silva; Edinho, Marcos Assunção, Márcio Araújo, Rivaldo (Lincoln) and Valdivia; Kleber.

Sun 19/09/10 SEA Palmeiras 0 – 2 São Paulo
Wed 22/09/10 SEA Grêmio Prudente 0 – 1 Palmeiras
Sat 25/09/10 SEA Flamengo 1 – 3 Palmeiras
Wed 29/09/10 SEA Palmeiras 2 – 0 Internacional
Sat 02/10/10 SEA Santos 1 – 1 Palmeiras

On the other side will be Avaí‘s team, not in a good moment, struggling to continue in Seria A next year. Ceará is looking for points to get rid of the bottom, since they’re actually in the 16th position with only 1 point above Atlético Mineiro, which won. Besides, Avaí may be in the bottom places today in case Atlético Goianiense wins over Flamengo and Avaí doesn’t win.

They’ve won only 1 match in the last 5, an expressive 5-0 3 games ago against Ceará, at home. Avaí can only get their good results when not playing away, since they’ve only won 1 out of 13 meetings away. For this match, Emerson and Caio have recovered from their injuries, but besides this fact, the injured list is still pretty large with 8 injured players: Marcinho Guerreiro, Diogo Orlando, Leandro Bonfim, Rafael, Eltinho, Rudnei, Valber e Vandinho. Jéferson is not available too, due to the death of a close relative.

Avaí: Zé Carlos; Patric, Emerson, Gabriel and Pará; Bruno, Rodrigo Thiesen, Caio and Davi; Robinho and Roberto.

Sun 19/09/10 SEA Avaí 0 – 3 Grêmio
Fri 24/09/10 SEA Vitória 3 – 0 Avaí
Sun 26/09/10 SEA Avaí 5 – 0 Ceará
Thu 30/09/10 SEA Fluminense 1 – 0 Avaí
Sun 03/10/10 SEA Avaí 0 – 0 São Paulo

Conclusion: Palmeira’s team is at their best shape since the beginning of the League, motivated with the recent results and only with the 3 points in mind, to raise in the table. Besides, they don’t have meaningful absences. On the other side, Avaí is not in a good streak. After an excellent result, we thought the team would raise again, but it didn’t happen and they only won 1 point in the last two matches. To worse the sittuation, the absent players list is huge and with games during the week and at the weekend, the team’s phisical shape is not the best, so I believe that Palmeiiras will take care of the match and earn an easy win here.