Fla-Flu: the story of Rio's Flamengo vs Fluminense derby
Flamengo and Fluminense share the Maracana, the city and a century of passion. How Rio's great derby was born and why it is unlike any other.
21 August 2026 at 03:57 · 1h ago · 2 min read
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The Fla-Flu is Rio de Janeiro's great derby and one of the most history-laden fixtures in world football. Flamengo and Fluminense share the Maracana, the city's streets and its bar tables, and the nickname became a trademark: the playwright Nelson Rodrigues wrote that the Fla-Flu began forty minutes before nothing, and no phrase better captures a match that seems to have always existed.
Like the Milan derby, the rivalry was born from a rebellion. Fluminense, founded in 1902, was Rio's first great football club. In 1911 a group of unhappy players left Laranjeiras and took football to Flamengo, until then a rowing club founded in 1895. The following year the dissidents faced their old club for the first time: the Fla-Flu was born as a family feud.
In the numbers, Flamengo carry Brazil's largest fanbase and lead nationally, with more Brazilian titles and three Copa Libertadores crowns, including 2019 and 2022. Fluminense answer with four Brazilian championships and the 2023 Libertadores, won inside their own Maracana, the trophy their history was missing. In the Rio state championship, the two have taken turns on the throne for over a century.
Some chapters became legend. In 1963 the Fla-Flu drew nearly 194,000 people to the Maracana, still the largest attendance in the history of club football. In 1995 Renato Gaucho decided the state title for Fluminense with the famous belly goal, a finish so improbable it became part of the derby's heritage. And between 2019 and 2023 the two rivals put Rio on top of South America, winning three Libertadores in five years.
Unlike Europe's great derbies, crossing the Fla-Flu border is no taboo: Romario wore both shirts, and Renato Gaucho is an idol on both sides, hero of Fluminense's belly goal and a star in Flamengo red and black as well. In Rio the rivalry is fierce on the pitch and companionable off it, a trait that sets the carioca classic apart from almost everything in football.
Today the Fla-Flu remains the derby of the crowds: it fills the Maracana like no other state fixture, splits entire families and turns every Carioca final into a national event. Alongside the Derby della Madonnina, the Derby della Capitale and Liverpool against United, it completes the proof that the world's great derbies are born from stories of separation, and none is as carioca as this one.
Frequently asked questions
- Why is the derby called Fla-Flu?
- It merges Flamengo and Fluminense, a nickname coined by Rio's press in the early twentieth century that became the brand of the city's most traditional fixture.
- What was the biggest Fla-Flu crowd?
- In 1963 the derby drew nearly 194,000 people to the Maracana, still the largest attendance in the history of club football worldwide.
- What was the belly goal?
- Renato Gaucho's winner in the 1995 Rio championship final, bundling the ball in with his belly to give Fluminense the title against Flamengo.
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