“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Encarnacion can pretend not to have heard.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
Something was said to Richar Olazar and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.27 on the card, and the Encarnacion support went home talking about one name.
The dugout1 May 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Franco Leys'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 The request is on a desk at Encarnacion, and it is not being withdrawn.
Mariano Ramos 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Daniel Haces was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout10 Apr 2028
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Ivan Romero, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Nobody at Encarnacion is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
In brief
The dugoutJosé Zuloaga knocks on the manager's door
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Juan Manuel Arias was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
5 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.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Tobías Sanabria is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Encarnacion will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Marcos Duré 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Jorge Aguilar was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Ivan Romero on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Puebla have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Matías Sánchez 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Carlos Henríquez was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Puebla has been clear about where Daniel Haces stands, which is more than many ever get.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Puebla. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 15 arrived, 0 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Luis Gabriel Rey has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Alonso Ramírez has written the date down.
5 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.
“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 Puebla, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 4 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
In brief
Squad14 new faces, and Puebla are still learning each other