Grenal in the Brasileirão: 0.65 sending-offs a game, typical game 0.26

In the Grenal, the Porto Alegre derby between Grêmio and Internacional, the average is 0.65 sending-offs per game. In a typical Brasileirão game over the same seasons, it is 0.26: about two and a half times as many. Yet in 14 of the 23 Brasileirão Grenal games, from 2013 to 2026, nobody was sent off.

This is an analysis of the numbers, and the question is direct: does the Grenal have more cards, more sending-offs and more penalties than a typical game? It matters because of the Grenal on 11 October 2026, at 17:30 (Brasília time), at the Arena do Grêmio in Porto Alegre, on matchday 30 of the Brasileirão.

After 29 matchdays, Internacional is 17th with 31 points and Grêmio 18th with 30 (CBF table, 8 October 2026). The count looks only backward, up to 8 October 2026.

Does the Grenal have more cards, sending-offs and penalties than a typical game?

Partly, and the answer has three parts. On sending-offs, the Grenal stands clearly apart from the average. On total cards and on yellows, it is also higher, by a smaller margin. On penalties and on the second yellow, the gap could be chance: randomly drawn groups of typical games reach values like these easily. The Grenal has more sending-offs than a typical game, but not more of everything.

How the count was made: 23 Grenal games against 5,222 games, from the CBF match sheets

The count compares the 23 Brasileirão games of the Grenal from 2013 to 2026, across 12 seasons, with the 5,222 games of the same championship in those years (the typical average uses the 4,462 games from the 12 seasons with a Grenal; 2017 and 2022 carry no weight). The numbers come from the CBF match sheets (the súmulas), the official record of each game, and were measured on 8 October 2026.

The window starts in 2013 because that is the year from which the match sheets have been open. In 2017 and in 2022 there was no Grenal in the Brasileirão, because one of the two clubs was playing in Série B.

The 2 Grenal games of the 2020 Copa Libertadores stay out of the average: it is another competition, and two games do not make an average. The one on 12 March 2020, at the Arena do Grêmio, ended 0 to 0 with 8 players sent off, 4 on each side. CONMEBOL, which runs the Copa Libertadores, wrote at the time that it was the game with the second-most sending-offs in the tournament's history.

The counting rule is the same on both sides of the comparison. A sending-off is a straight red or a second yellow shown to a player, and cards shown to the coaching staff stay out. A yellow is a player's first yellow; the second yellow has its own row, and total cards add yellows, straight reds and second yellows (in the Grenal, 5.74 + 0.43 + 0.22 = 6.39).

Red cards shown after the final whistle count in both tallies. Only one Grenal has such a case, the one on 6 November 2021, with 2; in the Brasileirão, it is 47 of the 5,222 games. Without those red cards, the count gives 0.57 against 0.25: still more than double.

The typical average is paired: for each season, the count uses that year's Brasileirão average, weighted by the number of Grenal games in it. The championship changes from year to year: 4.20 cards per game in 2019, 5.85 in 2023 (Soccer Addicted's archive, the portal's database of matches).

That is why the guide that measures 22 competitions shows 0.29 sending-offs per game for the Brasileirão Série A: it measures the league's latest 317 games as of 2 October 2026, roughly November 2025 to September 2026. Here, the Grenal is compared with the games of the seasons in which it was played.

Sending-offs: 0.65 per game in the Grenal, 0.26 in a typical game

On sending-offs, the Grenal has 0.65 per game and a typical game 0.26: the Grenal has 2.5 times the sending-offs of a typical game (the ratio between the two averages). To see whether that goes beyond chance, the count takes 10,000 random samples of typical Brasileirão games, with the same number of games per season as the Grenal. A sample's average reached the Grenal's in only 37 of them (about 1 in 270).

What this tells us: the Grenal stands apart from the average on sending-offs (2.5 times), straight reds (2.8), total cards (1.3) and yellows (1.2), but not on second yellows or penalties. One possible reading is that the difference lies in the cards that take a player off the pitch, and not in penalties; the table shows how much, not why.

The gap in sending-offs has a limit worth stating. The Grenal's 95% interval, the range of averages consistent with these 23 games, runs from 0.30 to 1.04 sending-offs per game. The floor (0.30) sits only a little above the typical average (0.26).

Because the count looked at 7 measures at once, the 1 in 270 is the best of them; adjusted for the 7, it is about 1 in 38 (0.026). The archive's match record, counted separately for 22 Grenal games, gives the same answer: 0.68 against 0.265.

In 14 of the 23 Grenal games, nobody was sent off

Few games pull that average up. In 61% of the Grenal games (14 of 23), nobody was sent off; in 4, there was one sending-off. The other 5 (about 1 in every 5) had 2 or 3 sending-offs, and none had more. Among typical Brasileirão games, 2 or more sending-offs show up in about 4% (1 in 25).

What this tells us: 14 Grenal games (60.9%) ended without a sending-off and 5 (21.7%) had 2 or 3, against 79.1% and about 4% of typical games. This suggests the Grenal's average comes from a minority of games with several sending-offs, and not from one sending-off in every Grenal.

The result holds up under several tests. Removing one Grenal game at a time, the gap stays between 2.1 and 2.7 times; the one that weighs most is 4 August 2013, the only game with 3 sending-offs. Season by season, the Grenal was above the average in 8 of the 12 seasons and below it in 4.

One test does not hold: in the share of games with at least 1 sending-off, leaving out those after the whistle, the gap (8 of the 23 Grenal games, 35%, against 20% of typical games, or 1 in 5) could be chance (about 1 random sample in 12).

Against other opponents, neither club comes close to the Grenal on sending-offs

Could the Grenal have more sending-offs just because it brings together two clubs that already have many in any game? The count separates the two things. In Grêmio's games against other opponents over the same seasons, the average is 0.26 sending-offs per game; in Internacional's, 0.30 (424 games for each club).

Both sit near the typical average and far from the Grenal's 0.65. In my reading, it is the strongest finding of this count, and it holds for both clubs: the excess lives in the derby itself.

What this tells us: on sending-offs and on cards, the Grenal sits above the 95% range of each club against other opponents (0.21 to 0.32 sending-offs for Grêmio, 0.24 to 0.36 for Internacional). This suggests the excess comes from the derby itself, and not from one club, although the Grenal's range on sending-offs (0.30 to 1.04) reaches the top of theirs and, on yellows (4.78 to 6.70), reaches theirs.

Is the Grenal the pairing with the most sending-offs in the Brasileirão?

No: among the 221 pairings with 10 games or more in the Brasileirão from 2013 to 2026, the Grenal ranks 5th in sending-offs per game. A pairing is two clubs, home and away, and the floor of 10 games leaves out pairings with fewer.

On total cards it ranks 8th; on yellows, 12th; on penalties scored, 44th. With the floors tested (8, 10 and 15 games), it is never 1st, and the 1st on sending-offs has only 10 games: the ranking is unstable.

What this tells us: 4 pairings, with 10 to 21 games each, sit ahead of the Grenal's 0.65; with a floor of 8 games it is 6th, and with a floor of 15, 3rd. One possible reading is that "among the top five pairings with 10 games or more" is what holds up, because the rank runs from 1st to 6th depending on the floor and the counting base, and the ranking carries no calculated uncertainty.

Rivalry is a different measure. On 12 March 2020, CONMEBOL called the Grenal "the derby with the most rivalry in Brazil". The phrase is the organisation's own, and this count neither confirms nor refutes it: it measures how much, not why.

How to read the Grenal of 11 October 2026 with the average in hand

When the game of 11 October 2026 ends, the count gains one more Grenal, and the average may change. To read that game, you can carry two numbers: 0.65 against 0.26 measures the distance between the Grenal and a typical game, and 14 of 23 measures how much that average depends on a few games. An average describes the games that have already happened. The full record of the two clubs in this derby is on the page that tells the whole story.