Autuori completes two months of Athletico "in silence"

The technical director of Athletico, Paulo Autuoricompletes 60 days at the club this Saturday (28). In his third visit to Hurricane, what draws the most attention is the manager’s “silence” in the midst of the crisis.

Since it was announced, on July 31, with a simple publication on the club’s official website, Autuori has not given any interviews to the press, nor has he gone public to explain to the fans after the terrible results in the Brasileirão and the eliminations for Vasco, in the Copa do Brasil, and Racing, in the South American.

After the 4-1 defeat, last Thursday (26), in Argentina, the 68-year-old director was asked by the press if he could talk about the club’s situation, but, smiling, he replied: “I stopped speaking a long time ago. I don’t speak anymore. I’ve spoken for 49 years”. Before this episode, the director was also a bit “disappeared”.

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In the absence of president Mario Celso Petraglia, who continues to work from home due to health problems, Paulo Autuori is the one who should respond about the choices for the football department. Last week, for example, the club fired coach Martín Varini and hired Lucho González for the position.

Autuori had a short and controversial spell at Coritiba this year

Before returning to Athletico, Paulo Autuori spent two months as technical director of rival Coritiba. There were only six days between Coxa’s departure and the announcement in Furacão. Node Coritibawas hired to be responsible for the club’s technical management and football methodological development.

The biggest controversy during his time at Alviverde was the impasse involving striker Alef Manga. The director took a stand against the player’s return to the club, after the end of his sentence, on July 25th. Autuori cited “moral principles and values” to indicate that Manga should not return to the club. The striker was reinstated to the squad this week and is close to returning to the field.

Another choice by Autuori, which did not work out in Coritiba, was the bet on Fábio Matias to command the team. The coach did not have much experience in the main squads, only as an interim player at Botafogo, and had a career in youth teams. In total, Matias had just one win, three draws and four defeats, for a 25% success rate, and left Coxa closer to ZR than G4 in Series B.

Autuori is in his third spell at Athletico

This will be Autuori’s third spell at Athletico. The first happened in 2016, as a coach. The following year, he became technical manager. At the time, Autuori always said that he no longer wanted to be a football coach.

In 2020, he returned to Furacão to occupy the position of technical director, but accumulated coaching duties on some occasions in which the main group was without a commander. In the end, he ended up resigning in February 2022 and left together with the then technical director Ricardo Gomes.

With Autuori behind the scenes, Athletico returns to the field against Flamengo this Sunday (29), at 8 pm, at Maracanã, looking to win again in the Brasileirão. Furacão has not won in the competition for seven games and has fallen to 15th place, with 31 points, just three behind ZR.