Marked for Mateo Ramírez
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market30 Aug 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Colegiales can pretend not to have heard.
Match28 Aug 2027
The wait goes on for Colegiales
5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Words at Colegiales training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elías Ocampo is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Match28 Aug 2027
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout30 Aug 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Bautista Pereyra was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Colegiales dressing room was either.
Player ratings30 Aug 2027
Successful dribbles: 13. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout30 Aug 2027
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout30 Aug 2027
Federico Marín knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Colegiales, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market30 Aug 2027
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Lautaro Gordillo signs something — a contract at Colegiales or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Jul 2027
32 days out for Lautaro Gordillo after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Colegiales will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market12 Jul 2027
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Maipú waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Colegiales is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market12 Jul 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Enzo Trinidad and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Market12 Jul 2027
Rosario Central paid $100.0K and Colegiales took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
The dugout12 Jul 2027
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Franco Hanashiro trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad12 Jul 2027
A row about effort at Colegiales
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gustavo Calderari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout12 Jul 2027
The manager makes an example of Mateo Ramírez
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market12 Jul 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Lautaro Gordillo’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match3 Mar 2027
Estudiantes ended it 2‑4. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
The dugout8 Mar 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Colegiales may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mauro Albertengo commits to Colegiales for another 2 years.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Franco Hanashiro and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Valentín Quevedo falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad8 Mar 2027
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
The dugout8 Mar 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 2‑4 Bautista Pereyra left the room before anybody could ask which.
Player ratings8 Mar 2027
Successful dribbles: 14. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad8 Feb 2027
25 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Colegiales lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The dugout8 Feb 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Boardroom8 Feb 2027
The instruction came from the boardroom and the dugout did not agree with it. Somebody will go, the fee will be called good business, and the manager will spend the season rebuilding around the space.
Match6 Feb 2027
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Colegiales have 3 straight wins of it.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Franco Malagueño falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Ignacio Vallejos and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match6 Feb 2027
Three points for Colegiales, 1‑0 the final word against San Miguel in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad8 Feb 2027
100 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
Boardroom8 Feb 2027
Colegiales board go back on their word
Something was promised, a deadline passed, and it did not arrive. Trust inside a football club is built over years and spent in an afternoon.