Recent public comments regarding the Integrity of the 2023 Brazilian Championship were not inspired SOLELY by the disputed Red Card decision of November 1.  Private conversations and formal correspondence between Botafogo and the CBF had been occurring for weeks, with no indication that CBF officials would take preventive action to assure that repeating errors between match referees and VAR officials would not continue to corrupt the results of the campaign.

 

As can be demonstrated by the below summary, the once commanding 'points' lead of Botafogo's record-setting campaign has been reduced...yes, by a 'return back to earth' after an unprecedented 14 wins out of 17 games, but also by an astounding number of obvious arbitration errors in critical games, resulting in the deduction of points from Botafogo and the addition of points (and red card advantages) to its closest competitors.

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Ultimately, when it became clear in real-time that the VAR official of the Botafogo-Palmeiras game had intervened to argue for a Red Card for Adryelson, and such VAR official was choosing not to show the match referee the clearest camera angle showing the Botafogo defender's legal challenge on the ball, I chose to highlight in real-time the harmful intervention and corruption of on-field play by off-the-pitch parties whose incompetence needed to be challenged.

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I made clear in my full post-game interview that I was NOT talking about financial corruption. I was suggesting that a heavy amount of error was corrupting our results, and compromising the integrity of the Championship.

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Please consider the following significant errors in our 2023 Brasileirao...