Sports Mole previews Friday’s Brasileiro clash between Atletico Mineiro and Internacional, including predictions, team news and possible lineups.
Atletico Mineiro will be aiming to continue their recent resurgence when they welcome Internacional to the MRV Arena on Friday in round 12 of the 2025 Brasileiro campaign.
The teams will head into this one off the back of contrasting results last time out, as the hosts narrowly edged out Ceara, while the visitors fell to a routine 2-0 defeat against Fluminense.
Match preview
Off the back of no wins and just two points from their opening four league matches of the season, Atletico Mineiro needed some time to get going—a surprise to many after they ended last season with nine wins from their final 10 matches across all competitions.
Alexi Stival‘s men finally got their league season up and running at the fifth time of asking with a hard-fought 1-0 victory over defending champions Botafogo on April 20, and that has sparked a recovery, to say the least.
Mineiro are unbeaten in 11 of 12 games since then, with their only defeat during that span coming in a Copa Sudamericana clash against Deportes Iquique, which, however, denied them an automatic place in the round of 16.
Last Tuesday’s 1-0 triumph over Ceara to kick off the month on a winning note saw Galo Forte Vingador record a fourth clean sheet in five outings after managing just one in the seven involvements prior.
Now up to 17 points from 11 matches, Mineiro are up to ninth in the Brasileiro table and have the opportunity to make up the gap on the likes of Flamengo and Palmeiras, who had their games postponed due to participation in the upcoming Club World Cup.
Friday’s hosts will go in search of consecutive league wins for only the second time this term, and their record against the away side makes for good reason with six wins from the last 10 meetings, although they did lose the most recent encounter back in October.
Internacional have endured a highly contrasting season on the domestic and continental fronts and will be eager for some consistency as the first third of the campaign comes to a conclusion this weekend.
Roger Machado‘s men have won just two of 11 league games so far, one fewer win than they managed in six Copa Libertadores group-stage matches en route to finishing top of Group F and consequently securing a place in the knockout stages.
Clube do Povo saw their five-game unbeaten run come to an end at the hands of Fluminense last time out as Kevin Serna and Paulo Baya struck in either half to settle what was a close contest in Porto Alegre.
That took Internacional’s tally of league goals conceded to 16 in 11 matches, the third most in the entire division behind Juventude and Sport Recife, both of whom are 19th and 20th respectively in the standings.
Ahead of what is set to be a crunch clash against fellow strugglers Vitoria when the Brasileiro resumes next month, Friday’s visitors will be keen to get back to winning ways away from home, where they are without defeat over the last month.
Atletico Mineiro Brasileiro form:
Atletico Mineiro form (all competitions):
Internacional Brasileiro form:
Internacional form (all competitions):
Team News
Brazilian duo Cadu and Caio da Silva Maia are both nursing knee injuries and are unavailable to play any part for Atletico Mineiro here alongside Brahian Palacios Alzate.
Tomas Cuello and Guilherme Arana are also unavailable for the home side due to hamstring issues, although the former is relatively closer to making a return to action.
Mineiro skipper Lyanco received his marching orders for two bookable offences last time out, making him ineligible to play any part in Friday’s encounter.
Bruno Gomes, Lucca Pelosi Drummond, Gabriel Mercado and Fernando—who came off in the early exchanges of the defeat to Fluminense—are all missing for Internacional through knee injuries.
Alexandro Bernabei, Johan Carbonero, Enner Valencia and Ricardo Mathias da Silva will not make the trip to Belo Horizonte as they continue to battle with hamstring problems.
Alan Patrick (suspension), Sergio Rochet (hand), Victor Gabriel (ankle) and Vitinho (elbow) round off the list of absentees for the away side, who are dealing with a crisis on the fitness front at the moment.
Atletico Mineiro possible starting lineup:
Everson; Alonso, Hugo, Rabello; Rubens, Franco, Silva, Natanael; Gomes, Hulk, Rony
Internacional possible starting lineup:
Anthoni; Ramon, Juninho, Vitao, Aguirre; Maia, Henrique, Tabata, Lucca, Wesley; Borre
We say: Atletico Mineiro 2-1 Internacional
While Atletico Mineiro have found goals hard to come by of late, they will fancy themselves to change that against a porous Internacional outfit.
We are backing the home side to just about do enough to secure all three points in the end.
For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.
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Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats, suggests the most likely outcome of this match is a Atletico Mineiro win with a probability of 54.98%. A draw has a probability of 24.1% and a win for Internacional has a probability of 20.95%.
The most likely scoreline for an Atletico Mineiro win is 1-0 with a probability of 12.1%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome are 2-0 (10.24%) and 2-1 (9.69%). The likeliest drawn scoreline is 1-1 (11.43%), while for a Internacional win it is 0-1 (6.75%).
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