Cerrado EC U20

Cerrado EC U20 settled the 2026 Campeonato Goiano Sub-20 in the final against Atlético Goianiense, winning 2-1 to take the title. The result gave the youth side its own line in the club's short record, separate from the senior team's championship of the Terceira Divisão Goiana in 2021.

Cerrado Esporte Clube was founded on 5 October 2020 in Aparecida de Goiânia, a project built rather than inherited, and its academy operates out of CT Toca do Lobo, the club's own training base in the Setor Colina Azul district. The name follows the mascot: Lobo do Cerrado, the maned wolf, and the club plays in orange and green.

The senior side's home ground, Estádio Annibal de Toledo, holds 4,800, though the U20s train and play at the CT rather than the stadium itself. Across town sits Associação Atlética Aparecidense, and matches between the two carry the weight of a derby with no love lost, even without a fixed name attached to it — unlike the Derby do Cerrado, a label that belongs to Goiás EC against Vila Nova and has nothing to do with this club.

No player developed at the academy has yet made a name elsewhere; the senior team's past squads have instead relied on experienced arrivals such as Alan Mineiro, Rafael Cruz and Tiago Ulisses, all of whom built their reputations at other Goiás state clubs before passing through Cerrado. The 2026 Sub-20 title stands as the clearest sign so far that the academy's own production is catching up with the ambition behind it.