It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Junior paid $330.0K and Deportivo Pereira took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Junior, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Santa Fe for Cristian Barrios was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The fee is $420.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Deportivo Pasto drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
The chase for Marcus Vinicius ended with $330.0K changing hands and Deportivo Pereira out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Junior this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Deportivo Pereira have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Sebastián Acosta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Deportivo Pereira have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Deportivo Pereira, and both men came out saying it was fine.
In brief
MarketThe clock does Tobías Bovone’s negotiating for him
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Anderson Plata was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Sebastián Acosta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportivo Pereira can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Deportivo Pereira have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Shots: 9. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Millonarios defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Sebastián Acosta was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Marked 8.01 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Jordy Monroy was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Marked 8.69 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Marked 8.40 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
7 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 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.
Anderson Plata was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Shots: 6. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Shots: 8. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
At 31 he has made the position his own, and the man he took it from has to find something to say about it. Deportivo Pereira have a decision that made itself.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
1‑4 to Deportivo Cali, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Yuber Quiñónes and Deportivo Pereira agree another 4 years.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Pereira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Still no offer on the table, and Richard Rentería’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportivo Pereira can pretend not to have heard.
Marco Pérez was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Marked 8.71 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
36 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
It needed Marco Pérez to find the net to bring anything home at all: 2‑2 against Atletico Nacional, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.