Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 112 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 The request is on a desk at Almería, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Almería have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Éder has just signed for Almería, and for once the answer mattered.
Dion Lopy 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.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 4 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
Marked 8.09 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
“I watch every Almería game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Real Sociedad runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 144 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Almería is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
José Giménez 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Obasi Onyebuchi is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Jaime Seoane has improved at 31, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Igor Zubeldia 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.
He is 21, he is averaging 7.07, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Real Sociedad have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Lucas Assadi has improved at 24, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 4 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
“I did not go to Deportivo La Coruña to sit and watch. I want to come back to Real Sociedad and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
Almería interviewed the field and appointed the corridor: Aimar Reyes keeps the job he had been doing in all but title. Sometimes the safest pair of hands is the one already holding the wheel.
The words a physio says slowly. 35 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 Almería they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
José Giménez 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
The words a physio says slowly. 72 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.
Eibar paid $13.6M and Almería took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almería this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
11 days with the chair empty, a list of names that grows and shrinks by the day, and not one signature on anything. Every week that passes takes the best candidates off it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Marezi signs something — a contract at Almería or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Real Sociedad have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
He is going to Sevilla, the club has $40.3M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Igor Zubeldia 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 average of 7.07 in a first team he is several years too young for. Real Sociedad have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Jon Aramburu 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 end came on a Tuesday, as these things usually do: a short meeting, a shorter statement, and Pol Campos clearing his office by noon. Football’s cruellest ritual, performed to schedule.
The words a physio says slowly. 79 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 official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
“Somebody has to pick the team on Saturday, and this week that is me.” An interim appointment with no promises attached, which is how most of them start.
“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 Almería, and it is not being withdrawn.
Dion Lopy 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Almería can pretend not to have heard.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Alavés the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Almería will enjoy reviewing.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
6.86, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almería this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
4 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almería this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 28 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Almería know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The fee is $1.2M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Barranquilla drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 14 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Mohamed Bolivar has just signed for Almería, and for once the answer mattered.
Miguel De la Fuente 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.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Sergio Arribas has improved at 25, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Casa Pia 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Casa Pia 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.
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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Casa Pia will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Casa Pia, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Casa Pia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Casa Pia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
20 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Arouca? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 58 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Boardroom7 Dec 2026
An order from above at Casa Pia: somebody has to go
Balance sheets do not care about form or about who the manager was planning to build around. The board have decided a sale is required, and the only question left is which name ends up carrying 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.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.