Brazil's Brasileirão New Rules 2026: What Changed Against Time-Wasting
Starting with round 23 of the 2026 Brasileirão, played on August 15, Brazil’s football confederation (CBF) began enforcing a package of nine anti-time-wasting rules — most of them already used at the 2026 World Cup, drawn from the set IFAB had been testing. A tenth rule, about VAR reviewing corner kicks, only kicks in during the 2027 season. A goalkeeper on the clock to release the ball, throw-ins and goal kicks with a five-second tolerance, medical treatment that costs a team an outfield player for a minute: if you watched Internacional take on Atlético Mineiro on August 22 and couldn’t figure out why the referee kept checking his watch, this is why.
Why the CBF changed the rules mid-season
The official reasoning is simple: the Brasileirão was averaging just 52 minutes and 54 seconds of actual ball-in-play time per match, trailing Europe’s top leagues and even MLS. CBF’s target is 57–58 minutes of ball in play in this first phase, with a second jump to 59–60 minutes planned afterward. Rather than wait for the season to end, the confederation applied the package right after the World Cup break, while clubs were already getting used to most of these rules from the tournament itself.
The rules, one by one
| Rule | How it works | Penalty for breaking it |
|---|---|---|
| Goalkeeper holding the ball | 8-second limit holding the ball with hands | Corner kick for the opponent |
| Goal kick | 5 seconds to take it once the referee starts the visible countdown | Corner kick for the opponent |
| Throw-in | 5 seconds to take it after the referee’s visible countdown | Possession turns over; opponent throws in from the same spot |
| Substitution | Substituted player has 10 seconds to leave the pitch after the board goes up | Risk of a yellow card, plus a delay before the substitute can enter |
| Treatment for an outfield player | Player treated stays off for at least 1 minute, and the team plays a man down during that time | — |
| Treatment for the goalkeeper | Coach or captain names an outfield player to leave for 1 minute in his place | — |
| Talking to the referee | Only the captain may approach when the referee crosses his arms above his head; everyone else keeps 4 meters away | — |
| Covering the mouth | Bans hiding provocative or disparaging remarks from officials during tense moments | Red card |
| VAR on a second yellow | The video assistant referee can review a clearly wrong red card triggered by a second yellow | — |
| VAR on corner kicks (2027) | Review of wrongly awarded corners that lead to a goal or penalty | Only takes effect in the 2027 season |
The mouth-covering rule split the technical council the most — the press nicknamed it informally after Vinícius Júnior, referencing the taunting incidents that fueled the debate. The vote landed 26 to 14 in favor, the tightest margin of the whole package, because coaches worry about red cards for ambiguous gestures that were never meant to hide anything from the referee.
Notice that the two medical-treatment rules — for outfield players and for goalkeepers — have the same practical effect: the team drops to ten players on the pitch for 1 minute. That mechanism, not a red card, is what explains a side suddenly playing a man down with no expulsion on the scoresheet.
Two of these rules already have their own deep dive on this blog: the goalkeeper’s 8-second rule and the one-minute medical treatment rule.
The Internacional vs. Atlético Mineiro case
On August 22, 2026, visiting Beira-Rio, Atlético Mineiro became the weekend’s most talked-about example, with two different rules showing up in the same match. In the second half, goalkeeper Everson went down after a collision with Internacional forward Vitinho and asked for medical attention. Under the rule covering that kind of play, it fell to Atlético’s coaching staff to pick an outfield player to serve the mandatory minute off the pitch in his place — the choice was forward Thiago Borbas. Later in the match, an Atlético substitution ran into the substitution rule too: there was a delay getting Ruan off the pitch for defender Vitor Hugo, and because the time limit wasn’t met, Vitor Hugo himself — who had already stepped onto the field — had to leave again and wait a minute before he was allowed to play.
It wasn’t the club’s first brush with the new rules. Five days earlier, in a 3-0 win over Grêmio in round 23 — the package’s debut round — forward Cuello sprinted across the field during a substitution to keep Atlético from being penalized under a rule that had come into force that very weekend. The moment became a reference point for how fast players and coaching staffs had to adapt, with no grace period or test matches beforehand.
What’s still coming: corner kick review in 2027
The package’s tenth measure — VAR reviewing wrongly marked corners that lead to a goal or penalty — won’t take effect for the rest of 2026. The CBF chose to push that change to 2027, giving officials more time to calibrate the review protocol before using it to overturn a goal that already stood on the pitch. Until then, a mismarked corner stays unreviewable, even if it directly leads to a goal.
Does it apply to every CBF competition?
The package covers Serie A, Serie B, the Copa do Brasil (men’s and women’s) and the Brasileirão Women’s A1 — it’s not a Serie A-only rule. State championships, run by regional federations, aren’t automatically included; each federation decides on its own whether to adopt the same package for its competitions.