- Vasco da Gama are the second Brazilian side to beat Boca away from home in a semifinal or final of a CONMEBOL competition.
- The Portuguese coach set up a team that pressed high with eleven men and held on to the 1-0 with ten for more than half an hour.
Until Tuesday night, only one Brazilian side had beaten Boca Juniors away from home in a semifinal or final of a CONMEBOL competition: Pelé's Santos, in the 1963 CONMEBOL Libertadores final. Vasco da Gama joined that list with a 1-0 win at La Bombonera, in the first leg of the CONMEBOL Sudamericana Semifinals. Behind the result was a decision by their coach, Pedro Emanuel: not to wait.
With eleven players, Vasco did not sit back. The back line pushed up and drove the rest of the team forward, the midfielders and forwards chased every Boca player who tried to play out from the back, and Santiago Sosa, at the base of midfield, made sure none of his teammates dropped too deep. Five minutes into the first half, Álvaro Montero had already been forced to stretch to keep out an angled shot from Bruno Duarte.
The approach contrasted with the profile Vasco had shown in this edition. The Opta data published before the tie described a team that defends close to its own box, with 59.1% of its defensive actions in its own third and 62 recoveries in the opposition half in 12 matches. At La Bombonera, the 'Cruzmaltino' went looking for the ball much higher up the pitch.
The reward came 24 minutes into the first half: Carlos Andrés Gómez sent in a cross from the left and Adson headed it into the net. According to Opta, it was Vasco's first goal inside the opening 25 minutes of a decisive CONMEBOL Sudamericana match in the last six years.
'I told the players something like this: if we want to prove something in this competition, we had to prove it today. I think we showed that we want to write our own history. We respect the past, but we want to write ours in the present', the coach said after the first leg against the 'Xeneize'.
The game changed 19 minutes into the second half, when Gómez was shown a red card. From then on, Boca had more shots (8 to 0), more possession (83% to 17%) and more corners (4 to 0), but just one shot on target. 'He came on to give us solidity. We knew that with a man down and leading 1-0 they were going to press and put crosses into the box', Pedro Emanuel explained about bringing on defender Gabriel Pereira, who was returning from injury, 33 minutes into the second half. According to Opta, Vasco are the second team since 2013 to win at La Bombonera in a CONMEBOL competition despite having at least one player sent off. The previous one was Nacional, in the 2013 CONMEBOL Libertadores.
The coach did not hide how hard the finish had been: 'Given the circumstances, we couldn't keep it up in the second half, but we managed to hold on and we take a narrow lead with us. It gives us confidence for what we aim to achieve'.
Pedro Emanuel arrived at Vasco in July, replacing Renato Gaúcho, in his first job in Brazilian football. Born in Luanda in 1975, he won the Portuguese league as a center-back with Boavista in 2001. With Porto he won the 2003 UEFA Cup, the 2004 UEFA Champions League and that year's Intercontinental Cup against Once Caldas, in which he scored the decisive penalty. As a coach he lifted the Portuguese Cup with Académica in 2012 and worked at clubs in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates before landing in Rio de Janeiro.
His Vasco debut came in the first leg of the Round of 16 Playoffs against Independiente Medellín, on July 22. Since then, the team have been unbeaten in the CONMEBOL Sudamericana: four wins and three draws in seven matches, with five clean sheets. With the one at La Bombonera, they have eight in this edition, one short of the record set by Estudiantes, who kept nine clean sheets in 2023.
The tie will be decided on Tuesday, October 20, in Rio de Janeiro. 'We know we are only at half-time in this tie', the coach warned, also acknowledging that Boca had 'two clear chances to equalize'. Even so, he allowed himself to dream: 'Winning away is better, especially in such a legendary stadium. We believe more and more that this can be our trophy'.
