Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Deivid Washington will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Goiás the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The phone has started ringing about Marcelo Pitaluga again, and this time the name on the line is Cuiabá. Goiás are listening politely and promising nothing.
“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 The request is on a desk at Goiás, and it is not being withdrawn.
Goiás have gone to Vasco da Gama 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.
Santiago Ramos Mingo 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.
Goiás offered $230.0K; Ceará said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad2 Jun 2036
Diego Caito falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
21 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Goiás they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Goiás can pretend not to have heard.
Diego Caito 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 had been thinking. Yuri Leles 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.
18 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Goiás is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Goiás can pretend not to have heard.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Santiago Ramos Mingo 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.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yuri Leles 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.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Goiás are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
44 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Goiás lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Goiás they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Goiás can pretend not to have heard.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Diego Caito 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 most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. Goiás will quote 16 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Marcelo Pitaluga is on it.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Goiás have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Diego Caito 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.
Still no offer on the table, and Santiago Ramos Mingo’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Goiás are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Goiás have lost him in all but the paperwork.
3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Transfer targets2 Jul 2035
$580.0K settles it between the clubs for Dieguinho
São Paulo have accepted the money. What Goiás do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
“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 Goiás, and it is not being withdrawn.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Goiás is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Santiago Ramos Mingo 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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and CSA waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Bahia is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Two goals and a mark of 8.18 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Jean Lucas 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.
The deal with Santos 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.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Palmeiras is saying, and nobody at Bahia is enjoying the guessing.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luis Henrique 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ronald was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Borussia Dortmund have kept their man, and Bahia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
1 for Pedro Jesus, marked 7.55, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Lucas 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.
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.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Player ratings21 May 2035
Mauro was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.18. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Player ratings21 May 2035
Filipe Gabriel was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.06. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
7.22, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Lucas 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 had been thinking. Ronald 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Bahia, and 2 appearances in 17 say he has earned the hearing.
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout30 Apr 2035
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.” Interim Coach chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Lucas 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.
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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 35 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Bahia is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The dugout23 Apr 2035
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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Lucas 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.
Caxias will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Giovanni Albornoz has pre-agreed a move to Bahia, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gean 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.
Something was said to Sebastián Grueso and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Guilherme Inácio may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
In brief
The dugoutGustavo Veiga asks for a word with the manager
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bahia they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Jean Lucas 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 had been thinking. Ronald 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 asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Bahia the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
“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 Bahia, and it is not being withdrawn.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Luis Henrique is living that version at Bahia, and it tends to show in the first month.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Lucas 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 Ronald was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout5 Feb 2035
The manager has not finished forgetting Diogenes'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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bahia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Lucas 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 Ronald was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 34 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Bahia is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Bahia, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Bahia have lost him in all but the paperwork.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Bahia have done the hard part with Ypiranga, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Jean Lucas 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.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $107.7K — a club that wants Léo Felix enough to be asked twice.
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 offer went to Caxias this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.