Absolutely fabulous: Luís Fabiano gatecrashes São Paulo's Fantastic Four to provide reminder of his quality

Bad news for fans of title races going right to the wire: it now seems unlikely that São Paulo will manage to overthrow the heavyweights of Cruzeiro before the Campeonato Brasileirão season ends. Going into the midweek round, the Tricolor trail by four points having played a game more than their rivals. Stranger things have happened, but rarely to a side so battle-hardened as this Cruzeiro outfit.

And yet, as thoughts turn to end-of-year lists and prizes, there is an argument to be made that São Paulo are some kind of people’s champions. Led by the ‘Quartero Fantástico’ – the Fantastic Four of Kaká, Alexandre Pato, Alan Kardec and Paulo Henrique Ganso – São Paulo embarking on a run of 7 victories in 8 games to climb above Internacional, Corinthians and Fluminense.

Yet after the Cruzeiro win came a frustrating stutter: just one point salvaged from four games. The chasing pack closed in; one of the runners in the two-horse race looked to have limped out of contention. One man, though, had other ideas. Luís Fabiano has stepped up to the plate in grand style in recent weeks, netting four times in five starts to put São Paulo back within striking distance once more.

Read the rest of this piece on O Fabuloso's mini-revival on the WhoScored site. 

Tears and tantrums: On Thiago Silva's fall from grace

Brazil’s doomed World Cup summer threw up all manner of memorable images. Most of those were of Luiz Felipe Scolari’s players looking utterly bemused during and after their shellacking at the hands of Germany, but there is one other that still stands out.

It is of Thiago Silva, the captain of the side, refusing to watch the penalty shootout against Chile in the second round. Almost 60,000 souls inside the Mineirão – in those hazy, hopeful days before it hosted that 7-1 – are urging Brazil’s players on; yet one of the men whose job that is cannot even bring himself to look. It later emerged that he had point-blank ruled himself out of taking a kick - not exactly leadership of the highest order, as many pointed out.

In the post-tournament scramble, Neymar’s appointment as Brazil’s new captain went almost unnoticed. But evidently not by Thiago. Having missed the first games of the Dunga Redux era due to injury, he jumped at his first chance to sound off about the transition at the weekend.

“[Neymar] didn't come and speak to me,” he told the press. “No one did. That's what's annoying. I can't pretend I'm happy. It's a sad, painful moment... like they took something away from me."

Read this piece on Thiago Silva's fall from grace on the Yahoo! Eurosport site.

Five youngsters enjoying a breakout season in Série A

With six games of the season remaining, there remains plenty to play for in the 2014 Brasileirão – even if those dastardly Cruzeiro schemers have already all but wrapped up their second consecutive title. The race for the Libertadores places is hotter than the surface of the sun (just the four teams on 54 points as things stand), while plenty of sides are still battling manfully against the drop.

For many, though, the real battle begins after the season’s end, when European clubs will once more come sniffing round in search of talent to tempt to the Velho Continente. Many of the names likely to be in the mix will be broadly familiar by this stage – think Éverton Ribeiro, Lucas Silva, Gabriel – but the gold rush is usually such that it’s not just the established stars who attract attention.

Without wishing to tempt fate (heaven knows Brazilian football could do with keeping its talented kids for longer), I have picked five youngsters who could be on the radar having enjoyed breakout seasons in 2014. Find out who they are on the WhoScored site.