Vasco was one of the teams that avoided relegation only on the very final round of the season. A goalless away draw against Ceará saved Vasco from having yet another shameful descending visit to Série B. The team even started in a good fashion, with Zé Ricardo at the helm, having reached the top spots on the table in the fourth round. However, the next five rounds were not so positive, and the coach Zé Ricardo, for some reason, felt that there were no conditions for him to continue at the club, asking to leave for much surprise of the club’s owners.
Valdir Bigode had his first call to manage the team temporarily. Then Jorginho arrived, shortly after he left Ceará, but things didn’t got on the right foot and around mid-August, three consecutive defeats made the board sack Jorginho and call Bigode again. The always serviceable gaffer led Vasco to three positive results and some fans wanted him to continue in definite terms, but the board went for the young Alberto Valentim, who had an interesting semester with Botafogo, earlier in the year. Things started very badly, though, with four defeats in a row, and the team dropping to relegation places in September. The rising form of the August signing Maxi Lopez led Vasco into a significant improvement, while Valentim’s new ideas was finally starting to settle in. From then on, Vasco was keeping an irregular pace with a victory here and a defeat there, which was enough to keep them out of the red zone until the very final round.
The arrival of defender Leandro Castan was almost as important and Maxi’s. The former Roma defender started to play in September, after recovering from an injury, and his addition coincided with Vasco’s best period in the season. On the opposite way, goalkeeper Martin Silva was a key member of Vasco’s organization for most of the season, but a big mistake in the 1-2 defeat to Grêmio came just before he joined his national team for two weeks; when he was back, he saw the reserve Fernando Miguel taking his place with some very important good performances in the final 5 rounds.
