Iván Román

Central Defender - Colo-Colo
27 Feb 2027
Saturday
Process

Marked for Iván Román

27 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

1 Feb 2027
From our football correspondent Uneasy

Squad

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.

Market

Colo-Colo promote Carlos Sierralta from within

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.

Market

One of our own: Gonzalo Valdes joins the Colo-Colo first team

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.

Market

Cristian Osorio steps up from the Colo-Colo academy

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.

Market

One of our own: Guillermo Medel joins the Colo-Colo first team

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.

Squad

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 dugout

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 dugout

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.

Squad

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.

In brief

Back issues
25 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

18 Jan 2027
From our football correspondent Uneasy

Squad

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.

Squad

Matías Fernández in a row with a teammate

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 dugout

The manager makes an example of Víctor Felipe Méndez

“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 dugout

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.

Market

The Tomás Alarcón question follows Colo-Colo around

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 dugout

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.

In brief

10 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

5 Oct 2026
From our football correspondent Steady

Squad

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.

Match

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.

Squad

Tempers go at Colo-Colo

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.

Squad

Real improvement from Leandro Hernández at Colo-Colo

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.

Match

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.

Squad

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 ratings

Lautaro Pastrán beats them one at a time

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 dugout

Víctor Felipe Méndez left out for the big one

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 dugout

When it matters, Matías Fernández plays

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.

In brief

8 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

21 Sep 2026
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

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.

Match

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 ratings

Both of them Javier Correa's — 8.99

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.

Squad

Javier Correa in a row with a teammate

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.

Squad

Tomás Asta-Buruaga gets the move he always wanted

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 ratings

One of those days for Matías Fernández

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 dugout

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 dugout

A satisfied Ivan Isla

“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 dugout

Jonathan Villagra gets it from the manager

“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.

In brief

7 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

14 Sep 2026
From our football correspondent Steady

Market

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.

Squad

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.

Squad

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 dugout

A promise honoured for Arturo Vidal

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 dugout

Víctor Felipe Méndez has been promised minutes

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.

Squad

Francisco Marchant: “I am not a substitute”

“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.

In brief

6 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

7 Sep 2026
From our football correspondent Steady

Squad

Tempers go at Colo-Colo

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.

Squad

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.

Squad

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 dugout

The manager makes an example of Víctor Felipe Méndez

“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.

Squad

Cristián Zavala slips down the pecking order

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 dugout

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 ratings

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.

Match

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 ratings

Maximiliano Romero could have had three

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.

In brief

5 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

31 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Claudio Aquino in a row with a teammate

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 ratings

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.

Squad

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 dugout

Joaquín Mattalia gets it from the manager

“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 dugout

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.

Squad

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 dugout

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 ratings

Maximiliano Romero was unplayable

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.

Match

No goals between Colo-Colo and Universidad Catolica

Ninety minutes, two goalkeepers with clean gloves, and not one finish worth keeping. Universidad Catolica will be the happier side with the point.

In brief

1 Edition

The Colo-Colo Chronicle

3 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Triumph

Player ratings

Lautaro Pastrán beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 44. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Match

Javier Correa leads the rout of Santiago Wanderers

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 ratings

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.

Squad

Javier Correa signs on for more

“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.

Squad

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.

Market

Erick Wiemberg wants European nights

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 terraces

One of their own: Iván Román

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.

Market

Morelia join the queue for Eduardo Villanueva

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.

Squad

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.

In brief