An unprecedented campaign saw Retrô Futebol Clube Brasil add an unprecedented nine trophies to their burgeoning cabinet in 2037. They not only won consecutive Série A titles for the first time, they also added a sixth successive state title, back-to-back Copa Libertadores, a first Recopa Sudamericana, became world champions at the Club World Cup and won three more trophies en route to lifting the Intercontinental Championship.
Retrô’s fans weren’t quite sure what had happened at their beloved club, having gone from not even existing 21 years ago to somehow becoming the best club in the world. Furthermore, the club was now considered the fifth most reputable in the world, only behind Liverpool, PSG, Man City and Real Madrid! However, those fans sure knew how to throw a party, welcoming their heroes to the streets of Camaragibe for multiple days of wild festivities.
Having achieved such huge unexpected success, manager Robinho Lazaró toyed with the idea of moving on from the club. However, after being approached by Colombian side Millonarios, the Retrô board stepped in with the offer to build a new stadium. He accepted, in the hope it may be named after him, and the off-season saw the board announce plans for a new 76,115 capacity stadium that will cost £73m and take until January 2042 (effectively four years) to complete.
Lazaró set about keeping his best players at the club by dishing out a plethora of new contracts to the likes of striker Matheus de Oliveira, captain André, goalkeeper Danilo Rodrigues, attackers Alex, Ézio Pinto and Marko Grgur Zubcic and centre back Nicolás Pino. However, they bid farewell to a club stalwart as midfielder Joílson decided he wanted a new challenge and moved to Cruzeiro for £1.9m after 492 games since coming through the academy in 2027. In his place, Lazaró promoted defenders Chukwuebuka Ogunniyi and Casado and midfielders Isaac Ismail and Criss Forbes. And, of course, Lazaró stuck with his tried and tested 4-3-3 approach.
More Domestic Dominance in 2038
Lazaró became the greatest Brazilian manager of all time as they lifted Recopa Sudamericana with a 3-2 aggregate win over Vasco da Gama, after entering the Hall of Fame top 20 managers of all time by winning Supercopa do Brasil.
The latest Pernambuco State campaign began in style as de Oliveira bagged a hat trick in a 7-0 thumping of Santa Cruz. They cruised through unbeaten once more, defeating Maguary 9-0 on aggregate in the semis and Náutico 7-1 in the final to win a 7th successive state title, setting new records for wins (11), goals (46), average rating (Zubcic, 8.25) and MOTM awards (Rafinha, 5). While Zubcic won player and young player of the year after 10 goals in 10 games.
For the first time, Retrô were made favourites to win Série A with odds of 13/8, followed by Palmeiras (12/5), Flamengo (13/2), Sao Paulo (15/1) and Guarani (20/1). The title defence began with Alex scoring twice in a 5-0 drubbing of Náutico. And that goalscoring form continued as they plundered 24 goals in the opening 7 games, only losing once at Sao Paulo. They lost 9 players to World Cup 2038 – which was won by in the USA – for the best part of 2 months, which stifled a good start,
Annoyingly, the trend of players demanding moves in light of interest from Saudi continued in July as Rafinha and Godwill asked to be sold and moved for £15m and £21m. That saw versatile academy product midfielder André Fubá step up to the first team, and he immediately impressed with a goal in a 3-0 win at Vasco. Retrô suddenly looked untouchable, and a 3-0 win at home to 2nd-place Flamengo, inspired by Zubcic’s hat trick of assists for Smaoui, Pinto and de Oliveira, moved them 13 points clear after 25 games.
de Oliveira became the club’s all-time record league goalscorer, surpassing the 124 scored by Godinho, as he scored twice in a 3-0 win over Corinthians. Still only 23, de Oliveira moved onto 125 league goals in 205 games. And his goals led Retrô to a third consecutive title with 5 games remaining. They went on to rack up a club record 91 points after 29 wins, 4 draws and 5 defeats, scoring 97 goals and conceding just 28. de Oliveira top scored with 26 goals and set a new club record total of 35 league goals, Cavalcante broke his own league record with 23 assists plus a league-high 132 key passes and Zubcic was the best player with a 7.74 rating.
An easy Copa Libertadores group was navigated in style with 4 wins and 16 goals against Bolivar, Nacional and Universidad Católica. An injury hit side earned an impressive 1-0 win at Racing Club thanks to Cláudio’s header before demolishing them 6-0 at home, in which they set a new gate receipts record of £1.7m. That set up a big quarter final with former affiliate Palmeiras, who won the first leg 1-0 at Retrô with their only shot on target and then won 3-1 in the second leg inspired by a brace by Vitor Roque – who impressively holds the league goals (387) and appearances (524) records after 13 years at Palmeiras – to end Retrô’s continental run.
For the second successive season, de Oliveira racked up 40 goals, followed by Alex (28), Zubcic (27), Smaoui (15 and Pinto (13). Cavalcante led the way with 28 assists, followed by Smaoui (20), Pinto (18), Zubcic (14) and Alex (12), and Zubcic set a new record average rating of 7.77 in 47 games.
Disaster Strikes in 2039
Moving into 2039, Lazaró moved on a mass of backup players. In their place, he promoted goalkeepers Nicolás Alvarez and Magnum, defenders Soren Nissen and Daniel Amoako and strikers Luis Eduardo Romero and 16-year-old recent intake star Célio Roberto, who Lazaró was looking to convert into a holding midfielder. While Zubcic rejected a £70m move to Man City to become the highest-paid player in club history on a huge £75k per week.
The latest state championship again began with a de Oliveira hat trick in a 5-1 thumping of Maguary before the striker scored 4 in a 6-1 thrashing of Porto de Caruaru. They completely dominated again, scoring 29 goals in 7 games including a new club record 8-1 victory over Vitória, before 7-1 aggregate victories over Afogados and Náutico took them to 7 successive titles and 92 games unbeaten.
A Copa Libertadores group alongside Olimpia, Lanús and Sporting Cristal began with a 2-1 defeat in Argentina. But a de Oliveira brace capped a 5-0 thrashing of Cristal before Zubcic scored hat tricks in home and away victories over Olimpia – second time around as a substitute! – and they qualified from the group with ease.
However, at this point disaster struck as my laptop’s D Drive decided to die. And that meant, without having saved the save file to the cloud and without a backup file for over 18 months, the save was at a premature end. We were probably on the verge of ending the save within the next couple of years, given the sheer dominance we’d established in Brazil. However, I really wanted to move into the new stadium and really dig into dominating Brazil and South America. But it wasn’t to be.
Centre back Wesley Martins scored on his Brazil debut in March 2038, on the same day as former youth product Godinho also made his international debut, before Carlos Eduardo also made his Brazil debut a year later and scored on his 2nd cap. Centre back Cláudio came in 5th on NxGn 2038, a few months before Zubcic won FIFA Best U21 Men’s Player ahead of Smaoui, the 2036 winner, in 2nd. And the latest youth intakes delivered an elite talent in striker Célio Roberto. And that confirmed the wonderkid factory was very much doing its thing.
However, our time in Brazil is, unfortunately, at a premature end, having established Retrô Futebol Clube Brasil as the best club in the world and potentially the best youth development program in the world. Hopefully you enjoyed this little adventure, and we’ll hopefully be back with more FM26 stories soon.
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