Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Carlos Cantillo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Jaguares the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“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 The request is on a desk at Jaguares, and it is not being withdrawn.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $100.0K — a club that wants Juan Diego Perdomo enough to be asked twice.
David Martínez 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 offer went to Depor 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.
The phone has started ringing about Thiago Caballero again, and this time the name on the line is Angostura. Jaguares are listening politely and promising nothing.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
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 Esteban Beltrán is on it.
The words a physio says slowly. 19 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Jaguares they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
David Martínez 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.
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 Esteban Beltrán is on it.
4 clean sheets from 22 appearances at Alianza Petrolera. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.
“I will play as long as the body lets me and stop the day it does not.” He is 33, with 250 appearances behind him, and the club has to plan for a decision that is not yet made.
The words a physio says slowly. 26 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.
Position 17 on 41 points. Every season is a story and this is the last line of it, and now the club has three months to decide what the next one is about.
“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 Jaguares, and it is not being withdrawn.
David Martínez 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Carlos Henao trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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.
The words a physio says slowly. 50 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 Jaguares is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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.
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 Esteban Beltrán is on it.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Didier Bueno’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Jaguares needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Jaguares, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The words a physio says slowly. 58 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.
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.
8 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
“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 Jaguares, and it is not being withdrawn.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.98 for the rest of it.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Wilfrido De La Rosa and Jaguares agree another 2 years.
6 goals in one match, David Martínez on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Jaguares and Atletico Nacional.
72 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Jaguares lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Jaguares this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Axel Batista wants continental football; whether Jaguares can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 35 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Jaguares is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Jaguares pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
79 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Jaguares lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Jaguares can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Jaguares have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Carlos Cantillo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Jaguares the goodbyes have quietly begun.
David Martínez 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 player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Roberto Riascos will call it something else in private.
Romario Murcia 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 16 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
“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 Jaguares will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Ánderson Mojica has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Jaguares.
The dugout9 Aug 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Sergio Arias was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Jaguares dressing room was either.
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 Esteban Beltrán is on it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.50 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Player ratings2 Aug 2027
Up for the corner, and Royscer Colpa delivers — 7.82
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Royscer Colpa scored, was marked 7.82, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Jáder Maza reports back to Jaguares with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Jaguares and Santa Fe in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Deportes Tolima have kept their man, and Jaguares go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Jaguares can pretend not to have heard.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 3 arrived, 3 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Duván Riascos 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.
Jaguares ran out of time with Deportivo Pereira. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
The dugout26 Jul 2027
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 1‑3 Sergio Arias left the room before anybody could ask which.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Independiente have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“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 Independiente, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Independiente have done the hard part with Ferrocarril Midland, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Independiente asked and Defensa y Justicia said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“I watch every Independiente game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Estudiantes runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Independiente have made the call to River Plate. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Santiago Mele 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.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Independiente have had the benefit of it.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Facundo Cruz and Independiente agree another 4 years.
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.
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 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 clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: another club keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Tiziano Hassell is living that version at Volos NPS, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad24 May 2027
Words at Volos NPS training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gustavo Santos 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.
Hamza Mendyl 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.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Volos NPS know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Núrio 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 González 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Volos NPS, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Volos NPS know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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 Nabil Makni has written the date down.
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Words at Volos NPS training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías González 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.
David Martínez 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.
Nobody at Volos NPS 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gustavo Santos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Volos NPS this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Giorgos Charalampoglou 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.
Nobody at Volos NPS 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Joca signs something — a contract at Volos NPS or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Hjörtur Hermannsson had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Volos NPS have lost him in all but the paperwork.
$350.0K on the table at Levadiakos. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Efthymios Limnios 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.
Three points for Volos NPS, 1‑0 the final word against Panetolikos in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Yvan Neyou 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matías González was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Volos NPS, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Volos NPS 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 Gustavo Santos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Volos NPS will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Nobody at Volos NPS 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.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Panetolikos in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Keidi Bare signs something — a contract at Volos NPS or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Volos NPS. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Yvan Neyou scored, was marked 7.82, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
At 21 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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ronaël Pierre-Gabriel, and the manager let it.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Volos NPS training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nabil Makni 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 team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Christos Limnios kept it short after the 3‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.