Arthur Schilling 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.
Squad11 Aug 2036
Rhuan Gabriel 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.
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
The goal that put Amazonas ahead was still being replayed on the concourse when Brusque equalised, 4 minutes later. Leads are only worth what you do with them.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Brusque will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The words a physio says slowly. 53 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.
“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 The request is on a desk at Brusque, and it is not being withdrawn.
Arthur Schilling 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 supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Brusque will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Peu has, at Brusque, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Brusque they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Brusque 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 João Fernandes was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Cristóbal López 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.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ramiro Enríquez 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Deportes Copiapó, another week without a signature from Nicolás Ruiz Paz.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Oziel Gorosito is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Interim Coach could afford to be generous.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Deportes Copiapó is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Bahia has just signed for Deportes Copiapó, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
Santiago Wanderers will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Daniel Cordero has pre-agreed a move to Deportes Copiapó, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. O'Higgins have kept their man, and Deportes Copiapó go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Nicolas Cuevas
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Deportes Copiapó people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“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 Deportes Copiapó, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Deportes Copiapó have done the hard part with Universidad de Chile, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportes Copiapó 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportes Copiapó can pretend not to have heard.
Everything agreed with Colo-Colo, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Cristóbal López 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.
A 1‑0 win over Deportes Recoleta, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matías Benardoni was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There were 88 minutes on the clock and Palestino had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Deportes Copiapó did not stop to explain themselves.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Cristóbal López 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Nahuel González has just signed for Deportes Copiapó, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Agustín dos Santos provided it, and the 8.09 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Deportes Copiapó is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
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 manager has re-ordered his thinking and Quilma 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Carlos Campos will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Deportes Copiapó the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Deportes Copiapó are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
27 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Deportes Copiapó 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 Deportes Copiapó 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 Deportes Copiapó can pretend not to have heard.
Cristóbal López 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. Ramiro Enríquez 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 words a physio says slowly. 34 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Deportes Copiapó is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Cristóbal López 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. Matías Benardoni 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. César Olmedo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Deportes Copiapó the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportes Copiapó this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Tobias Canale. 1‑0 against Deportes Temuco, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Agustín Pérez 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.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Interim Coach could afford to be generous.
0‑3 to Audax Italiano, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Jhusstyn Rentería: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
“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 Deportes Copiapó, and it is not being withdrawn.
Peu 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 Matías Benardoni was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Facundo Lencioni provided it, and the 8.01 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Deportes Copiapó is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Oziel Gorosito is living that version at Deportes Copiapó, and it tends to show in the first month.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Kevyn has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Deportes Copiapó have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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 Delvin Alfonzo 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
At 34, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Benardoni 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 manager has re-ordered his thinking and Eduardo Valdes 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Agustín dos Santos trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Deportes Copiapó, another week without a signature from Quilma.
The dugout5 Feb 2035
The manager has not finished forgetting Damián Constanzo'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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportes Copiapó can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. César Olmedo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Deportes Copiapó the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportes Copiapó this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vicente Villegas 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Deportes Copiapó, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Tobias Canale will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Deportes Copiapó the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Peu 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. Agustín Pérez 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 is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Deportes Copiapó are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
1 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Deportes Copiapó could ask drops and the wages Lucas Viana can ask rise.
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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Falkner Bermeo has, at Deportes Copiapó, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Deportes Copiapó asked and Universidad de Chile said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ivan Valencia is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Claudio Jara 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matías Benardoni was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Lucas Viana will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Deportes Copiapó the goodbyes have quietly begun.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Lucas Viana has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Cristóbal López 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Facundo Lencioni and Deportes Copiapó agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Agustín Pérez 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.
“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 Deportes Copiapó, and it is not being withdrawn.
The name of Tobias Canale has come up in conversations Deportes Copiapó were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Peu 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Benardoni 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Peu trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
6 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Deportes Copiapó could ask drops and the wages César Olmedo can ask rise.
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 Deportes Copiapó the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
In brief
SquadQuestions about Augusto on the training pitch
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportes Copiapó can pretend not to have heard.
Cristóbal López 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 Santiago Bouhet was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
39 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Deportes Copiapó lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“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 Deportes Copiapó, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Santiago Bouhet was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Deportes Copiapó, another week without a signature from Lucas Viana.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Deportes Copiapó, and both men came out saying it was fine.
5 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Deportes Copiapó could ask drops and the wages Dixon Pereira can ask rise.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Deportes Copiapó would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
46 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Deportes Copiapó lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Deportes Copiapó have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportes Copiapó they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Peu 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.
9 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.