The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Ibiza is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Ibiza can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
6 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
The team at the top of the table next, and the honest measure of where this side actually is. Anybody can beat the club below them; the question is what happens against Hércules.
Derlis Mereles 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.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.53 on the card, and the Ibiza support went home talking about one name.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Rubén Caballero was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Ibiza dressing room was either.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Georges was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
96 minutes played. Joaquín Barolín found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Sanluqueño went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tachi 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.
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Derlis Mereles 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 is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Deian Verón. 2‑1 against Hércules, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Joaquín Barolín has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Bébé 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.
5 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Rubén Caballero could afford to be generous.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Georges 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. 50 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.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Tao Paradowski is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
75 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Ibiza lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ibiza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Rubén Caballero to a room that had heard them before.
Nobody's fault and entirely his: a goal that goes into the book with his name against it and nothing about it intended. Ibiza deserved better, and so did he.
Chances created: 11. Not on the scoresheet and not remotely anonymous — a passing performance that pulled a defence apart without leaving a mark on the column that gets read.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Georges 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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Javi Eslava’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Ibiza needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Ibiza have gone to Elche with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
$3.4M on the table at Zaragoza. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $7.3M — a club that wants Yago Santiago enough to be asked twice.
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Boca Juniors is saying, and nobody at Ibiza is enjoying the guessing.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Ibiza will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Georges was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It is the quietest way a club tells you what its ambitions are. The money was asked for, the money was refused, and the people who work there every day now know exactly where they stand.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Víctor Solís has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Julen Duran has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Miguel Carrasco has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Miguel Giménez has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ibiza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.