🦁 Mirassol: the roar of the Countryside Lions

Brazilian domestic football is played on a massive scale. Unlike most nations, with a small handful of two to six grandee clubs, Brazil has 12 teams who can justifiably call themselves “big,” counting their fanbases in the millions.

But in 2025, Brazilian football history is being written by the minnows. Sitting comfortably in fourth place in the national league, with only a few games left to play, are Mirassol FC, a newly promoted team, hailing from a city of the same name in the northwest of São Paulo state.

Home to only around 65,000 residents, the entire population of Mirassol could fit inside the Maracanã stadium in Rio de Janeiro — and leave a good few empty seats.

But the rise of the so-called Countryside Lions, from being non-league in 2019 to needing just one more point to qualify for the Copa Libertadores (South America’s Champions League equivalent) is less of a fairy tale, and more a fable about discipline, strategy and working within one’s means…

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