The deal with Alavés is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Brian Rodríguez, and the manager let it.
The dugout22 Jan 2029
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 0‑1 Interim Coach left the room before anybody could ask which.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Gabriele Moncini is in the works
33 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oviedo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oviedo can pretend not to have heard.
Position 3, 34 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.
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Oviedo had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oviedo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
108 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oviedo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Oviedo 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 Oviedo they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
It is arithmetic now, and the arithmetic is done. A summer of hard questions starts early at Oviedo, and next season's fixture list reads very differently.
62 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Oviedo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Brian Rodríguez has just signed for Oviedo, and for once the answer mattered.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oviedo can pretend not to have heard.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Oviedo heard it as anything else.
The deal with Sheffield Wednesday is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
In brief
Transfer targetsNo thanks: Albian Ajeti rejects the move
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Córdoba can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Córdoba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
100 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.
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.