2015 Campeonato Gaúcho

The 2015 Campeonato da Primeira Divisão de Futebol Profissional da FGF (2015 FGF First Division Professional Football Championship), better known as the 2015 Campeonato Gaúcho or Gaúcho, was the 95th edition of the top flight football league of the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. The season began on 31 January and ended on 3 May, with the second leg of final. The 16 clubs contested in the Campeonato Gaúcho (Championship A1 Series). Internacional successfully defended its 2014 title.

Campeonato Gaúcho

Season	2015
Champions	Internacional
Relegated	Caxias União Frederiquense Avenida
Série D	Ypiranga-RS
Copa do Brasil	Internacional Grêmio Brasil (PE)
Matches played	131
Top goalscorer	Michel (Passo Fundo) 11 goals
Best goalkeeper	Carlão (Ypiranga-RS) 9 clean sheets
Biggest home win	Juventude 6–1 Aimoré (5 April)
Biggest away win	São Paulo 0–3 Juventude (11 February)
Highest scoring	Internacional 4–4 São José-RS (4 February)
Longest winning run	7 games Internacional
Longest unbeaten run	14 games Grêmio
Longest winless run	9 games União Frederiquense
Longest losing run	4 games Caxias Passo Fundo
Highest attendance	46,909 Grêmio 0–0 Internacional (26 April)
Lowest attendance	109 São José-RS 2–2 Cruzeiro-RS (26 March)
← 2014 2016 →

In the 2015 season finals, the two top ranked clubs in the state league (Grêmio and Internacional) qualified, reissuing the Grenal in the championship decision after both clubs narrowly escaped elimination in the quarterfinals. In the opening match of the finals, the game ended in a 0–0 draw at Arena do Grêmio. Along with the two finalists, Brasil also qualified for the next season Copa do Brasil. Ypiranga-RS qualified for the Campeonato Brasileiro Série D at this season, for being the best placed team without national division. Meanwhile, Caxias, União Frederiquense and Avenida were the three bottom ranked teams and were relegated for the 2016 season to the Campeonato Gaúcho Série A2.

Michel easily won the scoring title with 11 goals Passo Fundo failed to qualify for the knockout phase. The goalkeeper Carlão, of Ypiranga-RS, led the championship with 9 clean sheets, while Marcelo Grohe, of Grêmio, finished with 8.

Format

The sixteen participating clubs plays each other in a single round. The top eight teams qualified to the play-offs. The bottom three teams in the overall standings were relegated.^[1]

Clubs

The following 16 clubs contested in the 2015 Campeonato Gaúcho.

Club	City	Stadium	Capacity	Pos. in 2014	1st season	Seasons	Titles	Last title
Aimoré	São Leopoldo	Cristo Rei	10,000	11th	1961	6	—	—
Avenida	Santa Cruz do Sul	Estádio dos Eucaliptos	3,600	2nd (Série A2)	1971	10	—	—
Brasil (PE)	Pelotas	Bento Freitas	18,000	3rd	1919	16	1	1919
Caxias	Caxias do Sul	Centenário	30,802	4th	1961	54	1	2000
Cruzeiro-RS	Cachoeirinha	Antônio Vieira Ramos	8,000	8th	1929	20	1	1929
Grêmio	Porto Alegre	Arena do Grêmio	55,662	2nd	1919	73	36	2010
Internacional	Porto Alegre	Beira-Rio	50,128	1st	1927	71	43	2014
Juventude	Caxias do Sul	Alfredo Jaconi	23,726	7th	1925	57	1	1998
Lajeadense	Lajeado	Arena Alviazul	7,000	12th	1975	18	—	—
Novo Hamburgo	Novo Hamburgo	Estádio do Vale	6,500	6th	1930	62	—	—
Passo Fundo	Passo Fundo	Vermelhão da Serra	20,000	13th	1987	23	—	—
São José-RS	Porto Alegre	Passo D'Areia	8,000	10th	1961	31	—	—
São Paulo-RS	Rio Grande	Aldo Dapuzzo	11,500	9th	1933	28	1	1933
União Frederiquense	Frederico Westphalen	Vermelhão da Colina	4,000	3rd (Série A2)	2015	1	—	—
Veranópolis	Veranópolis	Antônio David Farina	4,000	5th	1994	22	—	—
Ypiranga-RS	Erechim	Colosso da Lagoa	30,000	1st (Série A2)	1968	25	—	—

First stage

Standings

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	Internacional	15	10	4	1	21	8	+13	34	Advance to knockout phase
2	Grêmio	15	9	3	3	20	7	+13	30
3	Ypiranga-RS	15	8	2	5	21	10	+11	26
4	Brasil (PE)	15	7	5	3	18	9	+9	26
5	Lajeadense	15	6	6	3	18	12	+6	24
6	Juventude	15	6	5	4	18	10	+8	23
7	Novo Hamburgo	15	6	3	6	13	14	−1	21
8	Cruzeiro-RS	15	5	6	4	13	13	0	21
9	Passo Fundo	15	5	5	5	18	21	−3	20
10	Veranópolis	15	5	3	7	10	12	−2	18
11	São José-RS	15	4	6	5	17	18	−1	18
12	Aimoré	15	4	6	5	16	24	−8	18
13	São Paulo-RS	15	3	5	7	12	19	−7	14
14	Caxias	15	3	3	9	10	18	−8	12	2016 Campeonato Gaúcho Série A2
15	União Frederiquense	15	1	7	7	10	24	−14	10
16	Avenida	15	2	3	10	9	25	−16	9

Updated to match(es) played on 6 April 2015. Source: Globo Esporte
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Wins; 3) Goal difference; 4) Goals scored.

Knockout phase

Quarter-finals

Standings

Team 1	Score	Team 2
Internacional	2–2 (3–1 p)	Cruzeiro-RS
Brasil (PE)	2–1	Lajeadense
Grêmio	1–1 (6–5 p)	Novo Hamburgo
Ypiranga-RS	0–2	Juventude

Matches

Brasil (PE) v Lajeadense

8 April Single leg	Brasil (PE)	2–1	Lajeadense	Rio Grande
21:00 UTC-03:00	Oliveira 31' Wender 70'	Report	Gilmar 45+1' (pen.)	Stadium: Aldo Dapuzzo Attendance: 4,960 Referee: Leandro Vuaden

Internacional v Cruzeiro-RS

8 April Single leg	Internacional	2–2 (3–1 p)	Cruzeiro-RS	Porto Alegre
22:00 UTC-03:00	López 77', 81' (pen.)	Report	Matheus 40' Wesley 50'	Stadium: Beira-Rio Attendance: 9,396 Referee: Diego Real
	Penalties
	D'Alessandro López Juan Moura		Laerte Heffner Jefferson Benhur

Grêmio v Novo Hamburgo

9 April Single leg	Grêmio	1–1 (6–5 p)	Novo Hamburgo	Porto Alegre
19:30 UTC-03:00	Geromel 70'	Report	Fred 29'	Stadium: Arena do Grêmio Attendance: 16,991 Referee: Anderson Daronco
	Penalties
	Maicon Bastos Luan Everton Douglas Oliveira Ramiro		Magrão Fred Humberto Luís Mario Paulinho Dê Schuster

Ypiranga-RS v Juventude

9 April Single leg	Ypiranga-RS	0–2	Juventude	Erechim
19:30 UTC-03:00		Report	Wallacer 11', 56'	Stadium: Colosso da Lagoa Attendance: 3,127 Referee: Jean Pierre Lima

Semi-finals

Standings

Team 1	Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Internacional	4–2	Brasil (PE)	1–1	3–1
Grêmio	3–1	Juventude	1–0	2–1

Matches

Brasil (PE) v Internacional

11 April 1st leg	Brasil (PE)	1–1	Internacional	Rio Grande
16:00 UTC-03:00	Forster 81' (pen.)	Report	Moura 45+3'	Stadium: Aldo Dapuzzo Attendance: 6,503 Referee: Anderson Daronco

Juventude v Grêmio

12 April 1st leg	Juventude	0–1	Grêmio	Caxias do Sul
16:00 UTC-03:00		Report	Giuliano 20'	Stadium: Alfredo Jaconi Attendance: 8,192 Referee: Daniel Bins

Grêmio v Juventude

18 April 2nd leg	Grêmio	2–1 (3–1 agg.)	Juventude	Porto Alegre
16:00 UTC-03:00	Luan 29' Geromel 76'	Report	Douglas 45+1'	Stadium: Arena do Grêmio Attendance: 32,855 Referee: Jean Pierre Lima

Internacional v Brasil (PE)

18 April 2nd leg	Internacional	3–1 (4–2 agg.)	Brasil (PE)	Porto Alegre
16:00 UTC-03:00	Alex 56' Valdívia 61' Moura 80'	Report	Márcio Jonatan 86'	Stadium: Beira-Rio Attendance: 27,395 Referee: Luís Teixeira Rocha

Finals

Standings

Team 1	Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Internacional	2–1	Grêmio	0–0	2–1

Matches

Grêmio v Internacional

26 April 1st leg	Grêmio	0–0	Internacional	Porto Alegre
16:00 UTC-03:00		Report		Stadium: Arena do Grêmio Attendance: 46,909 Referee: Anderson Daronco

Internacional v Grêmio

3 May 2nd leg	Internacional	2–1 (2–1 agg.)	Grêmio	Porto Alegre
16:00 UTC-03:00		Report		Stadium: Beira-Rio

Overall table

Unlike 2014, the overall table considers the matches played during all stages and the first criterion for the position is stage. In order to reduce the number of participants from 16 to 12 (14 in 2016) three teams that would be relegated to play Série A2 in 2016 and only one team would be promoted to the first division. The best placed team not playing in Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (Grêmio and Internacional), Série B or Série C (Brasil (PE), Caxias and Juventude) and the 2014 Super Copa Gaúcha champions Lajeadense will be "promoted" to Série D. The best three teams will qualify for 2016 Copa do Brasil.

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	Internacional	20	12	7	1	29	13	+16	43	2016 Copa do Brasil
2	Grêmio	20	11	5	4	25	11	+14	38
3	Brasil (PE)	18	7	7	4	22	14	+8	28
4	Juventude	18	7	5	6	21	13	+8	26
5	Ypiranga-RS	16	8	2	6	21	12	+9	26	2015 Campeonato Brasileiro Série D
6	Lajeadense	16	6	6	4	19	14	+5	24
7	Novo Hamburgo	16	6	4	6	14	15	−1	22
8	Cruzeiro-RS	16	5	7	4	15	15	0	22
9	Passo Fundo	15	5	5	5	18	21	−3	20
10	Veranópolis	15	5	3	7	10	12	−2	18
11	São José-RS	15	4	6	5	17	18	−1	18
12	Aimoré	15	4	6	5	16	24	−8	18
13	São Paulo-RS	15	3	5	7	12	19	−7	14
14	Caxias	15	3	3	9	10	18	−8	12	2016 Campeonato Gaúcho Série A2
15	União Frederiquense	15	1	7	7	10	24	−14	10
16	Avenida	15	2	3	10	9	25	−16	9

Updated to match(es) played on 3 May 2015. Source: Globo Esporte
Rules for classification: 1) Stage; 2) Points; 3) Wins; 4) Goal difference; 5) Goals scored.

Records and statistics

Goalscorers

This is the list of goalscorers in the 2015 Campeonato Gaúcho. Players and teams in bold are still active in the competition.

Rank	Player	Club	Goals
1	Michel	Passo Fundo	11
2	Nena	Brasil (PE)	6
	Ramon Machado	Lajeadense	6
	Paulo Baier	Ypiranga-RS	6
5	Wesley	Cruzeiro-RS	5
	Alex	Internacional	5
	Valdívia	Internacional	5
	Wallacer	Juventude	5
	Leandrão	Novo Hamburgo	5
10	Paulinho Simionato	Avenida	4
	Diogo Oliveira	Brasil (PE)	4
	Giuliano	Grêmio	4
	Luan	Grêmio	4
	Rafinha	São José-RS	4