Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 76 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
379 appearances across 13 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Bahia can tell you which week it ends in.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 83 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match29 Aug 2037
Nobody could stop scoring
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Bahia and Mirassol in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. David Martins wants continental football; whether Bahia can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 104 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.55 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
4 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.
8 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Bahia and Criciuma in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
Palmeiras will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Jon Esenga has pre-agreed a move to Bahia, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The words a physio says slowly. 17 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.13 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Erick Pulga 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.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 5 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 38 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bahia can pretend not to have heard.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.63 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
The words a physio says slowly. 101 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
29 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.50 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. David Martins wants continental football; whether Bahia can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Player ratings27 Apr 2037
Gerald was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.20. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bahia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Rodrigo Nestor 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 ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
In brief
SquadWords at Bahia training over how hard people work
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Gustavo Albarracín wants continental football; whether Bahia can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
In brief
SquadThe manager has not finished forgetting Fredi's mistake
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Gustavo Albarracín 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Erick Pulga 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Rodrigo Sosa will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bahia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadCaio Alexandre falls out with a teammate over standards
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Bahia will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
In brief
SquadCaio Alexandre falls out with a teammate over standards
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Erick Pulga 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
Squad12 Jan 2037
The manager has not finished forgetting Fredi's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mateo Sanabria signs something — a contract at Bahia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Clayton Sampaio will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bahia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Samuel has just signed for Bahia, and for once the answer mattered.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bahia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
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.
Marked 9.16 — 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.
9 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 34 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
23 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bahia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 14 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bahia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
The words a physio says slowly. 21 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Bahia scored in the 92th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bahia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.70 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
374 appearances across 12 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Gerald at his very best
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bahia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Matheus Menezes will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bahia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bahia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Luiz Mandaca has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Bahia have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Mateo Sanabria at his very best
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Gerald at his very best
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Yago Noal at his very best
The words a physio says slowly. 34 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bahia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Matheus Menezes has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
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.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Erick Pulga 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
“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.
Player ratings30 Jun 2036
Yago Noal was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.71. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
14 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Erick Pulga 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bahia can pretend not to have heard.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
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.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caio Alexandre 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.
Shots: 15. 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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
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.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
Squad7 Apr 2036
The manager has not finished forgetting Rafael Romero's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bahia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bahia can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Bladimir Angulo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bahia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
Squad10 Mar 2036
Erick Pulga 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.
Squad10 Mar 2036
The manager has not finished forgetting Rafael Romero's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
2‑2 against Fluminense, and a performance that will be described to people who were not there for the rest of the season. Rodrigo Nestor was at the centre of the description.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Fluminense kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Bahia will be asked about the last half hour all week.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Emiliano Machado: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
370 appearances across 11 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
11 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Bladimir Angulo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bahia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Rodrigo Nestor 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.
Squad11 Feb 2036
Erick Pulga 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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bahia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday. The order of those three tells you everything about what a football club actually values.
Jean Lucas 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrigo Nestor 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.
Squad28 Jan 2036
The manager has not finished forgetting Rafael Romero's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrigo Nestor 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Valentín Escalante is living that version at Bahia, and it tends to show in the first month.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Mirassol will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Gabriel Justino has pre-agreed a move to Bahia, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mateo Sanabria provided it, and the 9.15 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.90 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Bladimir Angulo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bahia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
4‑2 against Universidad Catolica, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
Two goals and a mark of 9.34 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.37 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Two goals and a mark of 8.62 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Position 3, 56 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.95 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bahia 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.” Bahia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Caio Alexandre 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.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bahia can pretend not to have heard.
Caio Alexandre 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.
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.
8.30. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The terraces22 Oct 2035
Bahia are taken apart by Santos — and the town wants answers
It finished 0-3. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bahia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrigo Nestor 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
27 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Caio Alexandre 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.
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.
17 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mateo Sanabria signs something — a contract at Bahia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.