Marked for Iván Román
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words exchanged at Colo-Colo
Matías Fernández 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.
Market1 Feb 2027
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Carlos Sierralta 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.
Market1 Feb 2027
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Gonzalo Valdes is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market1 Feb 2027
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Cristian Osorio 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.
Market1 Feb 2027
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Guillermo Medel is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at Colo-Colo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Cristián Zavala 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 dugout1 Feb 2027
The manager makes an example of Joaquín Sosa
“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.
The dugout1 Feb 2027
Iván Román has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Colo-Colo will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Vózinha is not saying it is over
“Ask me in the summer. I will know before anybody else does.” He is 40 with 306 appearances behind him, and Colo-Colo have to plan for both answers.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad18 Jan 2027
A row about effort at Colo-Colo
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Brayan Cortés was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad18 Jan 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Colo-Colo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
“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.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
Javier Correa gets picked when it counts
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 Javier Correa is on it.
Market18 Jan 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Tomás Alarcón’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
Marco Bolados asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Oct 2026
Fernando De Paul damages knee ligaments — 122 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 122 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.
Match2 Oct 2026
Colo-Colo do the business in Europe
0‑0. Continental football is where a club finds out what it actually is, and Colo-Colo came through the finding-out well against Boca Juniors.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Matías Fernández 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Leandro Hernández is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Match2 Oct 2026
Whatever happens, Colo-Colo do not lose
6 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Colo-Colo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arturo Vidal 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.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Víctor Felipe Méndez will call it something else in private.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad21 Sep 2026
Fernando De Paul damages knee ligaments — 140 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 140 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.
Match18 Sep 2026
A statement in Europe from Colo-Colo
3‑0 against Juventud, and a performance that will change how the rest of the competition talks about this club. Reputations in continental football are built in single evenings and this was one.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.99, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad21 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Colo-Colo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Tomás Asta-Buruaga has just signed for Colo-Colo, and for once the answer mattered.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.17, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The team sheet said everything about Maximiliano Romero
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Maximiliano Romero.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 3‑0, Ivan Isla could afford to be generous.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market14 Sep 2026
Only the photograph left for Jeyson Rojas
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jeyson Rojas will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Colo-Colo the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words exchanged at Colo-Colo
Matías Fernández 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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Colo-Colo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arturo Vidal 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
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Colo-Colo told Arturo Vidal something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
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 Víctor Felipe Méndez has written the date down.
Squad14 Sep 2026
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Colo-Colo will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Sep 2026
Claudio Aquino 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Erick Wiemberg 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Iván Román is the month’s best young player
At 20 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. Colo-Colo will try not to make too much of it.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
“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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Cristián Zavala is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
Half-satisfied: Ivan Isla on the draw
“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.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
A defender's afternoon for Javier Méndez
Defensive actions: 13. He was first to everything and second to nothing, and the goalkeeper had an easy day because of it.
Match5 Sep 2026
Point won or two lost for Colo-Colo?
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against O'Higgins? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
9 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad31 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Colo-Colo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Ninety minutes of Matías Fernández at his very best
Marked 8.12. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Colo-Colo.
Squad31 Aug 2026
14 new faces, and Colo-Colo are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
Iván Román is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words at Colo-Colo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lucas Soto 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 dugout31 Aug 2026
Ivan Isla: “We have to be better”
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 13. 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.
Match29 Aug 2026
Ninety minutes, two goalkeepers with clean gloves, and not one finish worth keeping. Universidad Catolica will be the happier side with the point.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 44. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match1 Aug 2026
3‑0, and Javier Correa took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Colo-Colo tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A brace, and Javier Correa takes the afternoon — 9.05
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Javier Correa provided it, and the 9.05 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Javier Correa and Colo-Colo agree another 2 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Colo-Colo
Javier Correa 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
The terraces3 Aug 2026
He is 20 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
Add another name to the list: Morelia have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Eduardo Villanueva. The answer from Colo-Colo has not changed — yet.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Arturo Vidal 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.