Marked for David Useche
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad25 Sep 2028
The knee: José Sequera out for 21 days
21 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Zamora lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Words exchanged at Zamora
Edwuin Pernía 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.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Anthonys Matos 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.
The dugout25 Sep 2028
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 dugout25 Sep 2028
Jhon Escobar 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.
Market25 Sep 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Edwuin Pernía’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Aug 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zamora this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Words at Zamora training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Anthonys Matos 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.
Boardroom7 Aug 2028
Wages eat 112% of everything Zamora earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad7 Aug 2028
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Edinson Largacha is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
The dugout7 Aug 2028
“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.
Squad7 Aug 2028
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.
The dugout7 Aug 2028
The manager makes an example of Jhon Escobar
“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 dugout7 Aug 2028
Arlés Flores has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Zamora 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.
Market7 Aug 2028
The shop window has César Urpín in it
Zamora have let the market know César Urpín can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
From our football correspondent
Steady
The dugout31 Jul 2028
“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.
Market31 Jul 2028
Only the photograph left for Shola Oduoye
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Shola Oduoye will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Caracas the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Boardroom31 Jul 2028
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. David Useche 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.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Christian Larotonda 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.
Boardroom31 Jul 2028
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.
The dugout31 Jul 2028
The manager makes an example of Miguel Pernía
“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 dugout31 Jul 2028
Rafael Arace has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Caracas 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.
Market31 Jul 2028
The Rafael Arace story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Rafael Arace signs something — a contract at Caracas or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Loan watch31 Jul 2028
Frankarlos Benítez’s loan is measured in nothing happening
5 clean sheets from 17 appearances at Mirassol. 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad31 Jul 2028
A falling-out at Zamora
Beycker Velásquez and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom31 Jul 2028
Caracas will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. David Useche has pre-agreed a move to Zamora, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Transfer targets31 Jul 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Boca Juniors have kept their man, and Zamora go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Transfer targets31 Jul 2028
The clock did what Deportivo Miranda would not, and ended it. Supporters who watched the countdown will spend the next window doing it again.
The dugout31 Jul 2028
José Sequera 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.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Yeifer Herrera 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.
The dugout31 Jul 2028
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 Néstor Jiménez is on it.
Market31 Jul 2028
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Zamora know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Squad31 Jul 2028
A new face in his position and a shirt he thought he owned suddenly up for discussion. Zamora have promised nothing, which is what clubs promise at this stage.