Nacional AC MG

Nacional's derby days are away from home more often than not: the closest thing Muriaé has to a proper rival sits in Juiz de Fora, and matches against Tupynambás Futebol Clube carry the weight of the Zona da Mata for a club with no local peer to fight. There is no name for it, no ritual attached, just two clubs from the same corner of Minas Gerais who keep meeting.

The town itself is the more reliable measure of the club. Nacional has won the Liga Esportiva de Muriaé nine times, more than anyone else who has played it, spread across three decades from 1955 to 1998 with no real gap long enough to suggest decline. That municipal record has outlasted every run the club had in wider competition.

The wider runs did happen, briefly. Promotion came in 1969, beating Athletic Club at the Mineirão to leave the state's second division behind, and the eleven years that followed in the top flight were the only period the club had a name outside Muriaé. The high point came in 1977, a 2-0 win over Guarani de Divinópolis in front of more than 130,000 at the Mineirão for the Torneio Incentivo Mineiro. Two years later, under Argemiro Moreira, the side led the Módulo I table on its own for several rounds before settling for fourth, the best finish the club has managed.

None of it held. Municipal and business backing dried up, and Nacional pulled out of the top division in 1980, never to return. Professional football at the club stopped altogether in 2005 and did not start again until 2013, when a partnership with Nacional Esporte Clube put a team back on the pitch under the same name. It has stayed in the lower tiers since, dropping to the third division for 2026 after last season. The club that once filled the Mineirão now plays out its history where it always did: in Muriaé, against Juiz de Fora, in front of whoever still shows up.