Marked for Benjamín Durán
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match15 Jan 2029
Atlantas up to position 3
18 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Market15 Jan 2029
“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 The request is on a desk at Atlantas, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market15 Jan 2029
Suduva come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Atlantas did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad15 Jan 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Atlantas this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Jan 2029
“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.
Market15 Jan 2029
Atlantas have let the market know Fərid İsgəndərov can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market21 Feb 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Atlantas they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad21 Feb 2028
99 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Fərid İsgəndərov 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market24 Jan 2028
“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.
Market24 Jan 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Edvinas Valskis will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Atlantas the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Fərid İsgəndərov 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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
The medical room confirms 52 days on the sidelines for Benjamín Durán, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad24 Jan 2028
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Atlantas know it.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Juan Chavira 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 Atlantas, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market29 Nov 2027
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Paulius Kazlauskas will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Atlantas the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad29 Nov 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Atlantas this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Nov 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Atlantas know it.
Squad29 Nov 2027
27 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Squad29 Nov 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Juan Chavira, and the manager let it.
Market29 Nov 2027
The name of Paulius Paulauskas keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Atlantas say nothing, which says plenty.