“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 The request is on a desk at Cartagena, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Cartagena have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Cartagena have done the hard part with Barcelona, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
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 manager has re-ordered his thinking and Alfredo Ortuño 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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Lucho García has his answer from Cartagena; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sabadell will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Alberto Marí 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 Theo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout31 May 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Hernán Gautier'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.
The words a physio says slowly. 114 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sabadell 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.
8 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.
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 Urri has written the date down.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sabadell have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sabadell this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Theo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Ibai Montes on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Sabadell will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sabadell this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Quadri Liameed was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Hernán Gautier'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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Sabadell will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Sabadell asked and Betis said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Sabadell, another week without a signature from Martín Aguirregabiria.
A mark of 7.19, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Sabadell training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Quadri Liameed 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 dugout14 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Ibai Montes chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sabadell will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Sabadell close the window on a squad of their own making
20 in and 1 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Martín Aguirregabiria 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.
7 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sabadell this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Sabadell know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Sabadell are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.