Copa do Nordeste

Copa do Nordeste (English: Cup of the North-East), also known as Campeonato do Nordeste (English: Championship of the North-East) or Copa Nordeste (English: Northeastern Cup) is a Brazilian football competition among Northeastern region teams. It is sometimes informally referred to as Lampions League^[1][2] – in reference to the UEFA Champions League and bandit folk hero Lampião.

Copa do Nordeste

Organising body	Brazilian Football Confederation
Founded	1994; 31 years ago (1994)
Region	Brazil's Northeast
Number of teams	20
Qualifier for	Copa do Brasil (third stage)
Current champions	Fortaleza (3rd title)
Most successful club(s)	Bahia Vitória (4 titles each)
Television broadcasters	SBT DAZN Nosso Futebol
Website	Official website
2025 Copa do Nordeste

History

For the previous tournaments held in Northeast region, see List of Brazilian North-Northeast football champions (1946–1993).

The competition was first played in 1994. From 1997 to 1999, the Campeonato do Nordeste champions granted qualification to Copa Conmebol.^[3]

From 2000 to 2002, the Campeonato do Nordeste champions granted qualification to the Copa dos Campeões.

The competition returned in 2010, after being defunct since 2003.^[4] Copa do Nordeste returned again in 2013.

From 2014 to 2016, the winner got a spot in the Copa Sudamericana. The Copa do Nordeste champion now qualifies to the Copa do Brasil.

Competition format

Since 2018 a qualifying tournament called Pré-Copa do Nordeste has been played. In this tournament, eight teams compete in a single-elimination tournament where the four winners advance to the Copa do Nordeste.

The Copa do Nordeste has in its first stage two groups. 12 teams gain direct entries into the group stage while the other four berths are decided by the Pré-Copa do Nordeste.

In the group stage, each group is played on a single round-robin basis against the eight clubs from the other group. The top four teams of each group advance to the quarter-finals.

The quarter-finals, semi-finals and finals are played a single-elimination tournament. Only the finals are played on a home-and-away two-legged basis, with the best tournament team hosting the second leg, while quarter-finals and semi-finals are played on a single-leg basis, with the higher-seeded team hosting the leg.

List of champions

Year	Champion	Final match	Runners-up	Third place	Fourth place
1994 Details	Sport (1) PE	0 – 0 (3–2 pen.)	CRB AL	Bahia BA	Cruzeiro de Arapiraca AL
1995–1996	Not held
1997 Details	Vitória (1) BA	3 – 0 1 – 2 Aggregate 4 – 2	Bahia BA	Sport PE	Ceará CE
1998 Details	América (1) RN	1 – 2 3 – 1 Aggregate 4 – 3	Vitória BA	Bahia BA	Santa Cruz PE
1999 Details	Vitória (2) BA	2 – 0 0 – 1 Aggregate 2 – 1	Bahia BA	CSA AL	Sport PE
2000 Details	Sport (2) PE	2 – 2 2 – 2 Aggregate 4 – 4	Vitória BA	Poções BA	Sergipe SE
2001 Details	Bahia (1) BA	3 – 1	Sport PE	Náutico PE	Fortaleza CE
2002 Details	Bahia (2) BA	3 – 1 2 – 2 Aggregate 5 – 3	Vitória BA	Náutico PE	Santa Cruz PE
2003 Details	Vitória (3) BA	1 – 1 0 – 0 Aggregate 1 – 1	Fluminense de Feira BA	ABC RN	América RN
2004–2009	Not held
2010 Details	Vitória (4) BA	2 – 1	ABC RN	CSA AL	Treze PB
2011–2012	Not held
2013 Details	Campinense (1) PB	2 – 1 2 – 0 Aggregate 4 – 1	ASA AL	Ceará CE	Fortaleza CE
2014 Details	Sport (3) PE	2 – 0 1 – 1 Aggregate 3 – 1	Ceará CE	América RN	Santa Cruz PE
2015 Details	Ceará (1) CE	1 – 0 2 – 1 Aggregate 3 – 1	Bahia BA	Vitória BA	Sport PE
2016 Details	Santa Cruz (1) PE	2 – 1 1 – 1 Aggregate 3 – 2	Campinense PB	Bahia BA	Sport PE
2017 Details	Bahia (3) BA	1 – 1 1 – 0 Aggregate 2 – 1	Sport PE	Vitória BA	Santa Cruz PE
2018 Details	Sampaio Corrêa (1) MA	1 – 0 0 – 0 Aggregate 1 – 0	Bahia BA	ABC RN	Ceará CE
2019 Details	Fortaleza (1) CE	1 – 0 1 – 0 Aggregate 2 – 0	Botafogo PB	Náutico PE	Santa Cruz PE
2020 Details	Ceará (2) CE	3 – 1 1 – 0 Aggregate 4 – 1	Bahia BA	Fortaleza CE	Confiança SE
2021 Details	Bahia (4) BA	0 – 1 2 – 1 (4–2 pen.)	Ceará CE	Fortaleza CE	Vitória BA
2022 Details	Fortaleza (2) CE	1 – 1 1 – 0 Aggregate 2 – 1	Sport PE	Náutico PE	CRB AL
2023 Details	Ceará (3) CE	2 – 1 0 – 1 (4–2 pen.)	Sport PE	Fortaleza CE	ABC RN
2024 Details	Fortaleza (3) CE	2 – 0 0 – 2 (5–4 pen.)	CRB AL	Bahia BA	Sport PE

Performances

By club

Performance in the Northeastern Cup by club

Club	Winners	Runners-up	Years winners	Years runners-up
Bahia	4	5	2001, 2002, 2017, 2021	1997, 1999, 2015, 2018, 2020
Vitória	4	3	1997, 1999, 2003, 2010	1998, 2000, 2002
Sport	3	4	1994, 2000, 2014	2001, 2017, 2022, 2023
Ceará	3	2	2015, 2020, 2023	2014, 2021
Fortaleza	3	0	2019, 2022, 2024	—
Campinense	1	1	2013	2016
América	1	0	1998	—
Sampaio Corrêa	1	0	2018	—
Santa Cruz	1	0	2016	—
CRB	0	2	—	1994, 2024
ABC	0	1	—	2010
ASA	0	1	—	2013
Botafogo-PB	0	1	—	2019
Fluminense de Feira	0	1	—	2003

By state

Performance by state

State	Winners	Runners-up
Bahia	8	9
Ceará	6	2
Pernambuco	4	4
Paraíba	1	2
Rio Grande do Norte	1	1
Maranhão	1	0
Alagoas	0	3
Piauí	0	0
Sergipe	0	0

Top scorers

Year	Player (team)	Goals
1994	Fábio (Sport)	5
1997	Nildo (Ceará)	6
1998	Paulinho Kobayashi (América de Natal)	9
1999	Ueslei (Bahia)	10
2000	Leonardo (ABC) Pedro Costa (Sergipe)	6
2001	Kuki (Náutico)	12
2002	Sérgio Alves (Bahia)	13
2003	Nádson (Vitória)	5
2010	Cristiano Alagoano (Confiança)	10
2013	Marcelo Nicácio (Vitória) Rodrigo Silva (ABC)	5
2014	Magno Alves (Ceará)	8
2015	Max (América de Natal)	6
2016	Rodrigão (Campinense)	9
2017	Régis (Bahia)	6
2018	Arthur Cabral (Ceará) Yago Felipe (Vitória)	5
2019	Gilberto (Bahia) Júnior Santos (Fortaleza)	8
2020	Vina (Ceará)	5
2021	Gilberto (Bahia)	8
2022	Hugo Rodallega (Bahia)	8
2023	Juan Martín Lucero (Fortaleza) Luciano Juba (Sport)	6
2024	Moisés (Fortaleza)	7

Winning managers

Year	Manager	Club
1994	Givanildo Oliveira	Sport
1997	Arturzinho	Vitória
1998	Arturzinho	América de Natal
1999	Ricardo Gomes	Vitória
2000	Celso Roth	Sport
2001	Evaristo de Macedo	Bahia
2002	Bobô	Bahia
2003	Joel Santana	Vitória
2011	Ricardo Silva	Vitória
2013	Oliveira Canindé	Campinense
2014	Eduardo Baptista	Sport
2015	Silas	Ceará
2016	Milton Mendes	Santa Cruz
2017	Guto Ferreira	Bahia
2018	Roberto Fonseca	Sampaio Corrêa
2019	Rogério Ceni	Fortaleza
2020	Guto Ferreira	Ceará
2021	Dado Cavalcanti	Bahia
2022	Juan Pablo Vojvoda	Fortaleza
2023	Eduardo Barroca	Ceará
2024	Juan Pablo Vojvoda	Fortaleza