The deal with Água Santa is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Fluminense have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Fluminense asked and Atlético Goianiense said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Fluminense offered $3.9M; Atlético Mineiro said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
1 for Danilo, marked 7.67, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Fluminense this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
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.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Wesley Natã had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Fluminense and Atlético Mineiro have settled on $550.0K. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.98 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
The offer went to Atlético Goianiense 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 number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $2.2M — a club that wants Adriano Mina enough to be asked twice.
Daniel Fuzato 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Fluminense 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 Fluminense this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 21 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
26 games, 9 goals, and a squad option that has arrived without a fee attached. The interesting question at Fluminense now is not whether he plays but who he displaces.
Squad31 May 2027
John Kennedy 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.
Nobody at Fluminense 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.
The dugout31 May 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Guilherme Borges was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Fluminense dressing room was either.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fluminense is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and John Kennedy was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Guilherme Borges after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Marked 8.44 — 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marco Di Cesare was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 8.20 — 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.
Player ratings10 May 2027
Duván Vergara was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.12. 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.
Marcos Rojo 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Thiago Taborda and Racing Club agree another 4 years.
“I watch every Racing Club game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Fluminense runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Fluminense may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Fluminense training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jefferson Savarino 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.
Marked 8.23 — 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.
1 error, one goal, and a night in front of the same three seconds. He will see it tonight, tomorrow and probably in February, and everybody who has played knows exactly which frame he keeps stopping on.
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 Pedro Morisco is on it.
Matías Pérez 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 name of Elías Torres has come up in conversations Racing Club were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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 watch every Racing Club game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Fluminense runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The dugout12 Apr 2027
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.” Miguel Ángel Escobar kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Racing Club can pretend not to have heard.
Matías Pérez 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Duván Vergara. 1‑0 against Banfield, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Marked 8.17. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Racing Club.
Squad15 Mar 2027
8 new faces, and Racing Club 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Racing Club, and 0 appearances in 10 say he has earned the hearing.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Miguel Ángel Escobar on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
John Kennedy 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Fluminense this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Fluminense, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
Nobody at Fluminense 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 Jefferson Savarino signs something — a contract at Fluminense or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Fluminense has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Alexander Barboza 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 Marco Di Cesare was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
8 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Racing Club, and 0 appearances in 6 say he has earned the hearing.
The dugout15 Feb 2027
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Miguel Ángel Escobar, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Fluminense will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Fluminense people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The deal that would have taken John Kennedy to Athletico Paranaense has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Fluminense with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Martinelli 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.
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 Fluminense have had the benefit of it.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Pedro Morisco had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $11.5M has been paid because Alexander Barboza is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Union Espanola waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Racing Club is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Racing Club can pretend not to have heard.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $3.3M — a club that wants Alexis Domínguez enough to be asked twice.
Valentín Carboni 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.
A season average of 7.04 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Racing Club know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Alexander Barboza was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $11.5M. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matías Zaracho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Racing Club paid $4.7M and Coritiba took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Sebastián Gómez 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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Bruno Melo 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 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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
5 new faces, and Coritiba 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.
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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of David da Hora
The dugoutLucas Ronier knocks on the manager's door
Qualification is done, and next season the floodlights come on for something bigger. A stage for the players, oxygen for the accounts and a passport for everybody else.
Racing Club have a 21-year-old the division has just voted its finest young footballer. The club's next problem is that everybody else now knows it too.
The offer from Talleres for Facundo Cambeses was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Racing Club have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Coritiba did not want to sell and the number is why they did. $4.7M for Pedro Morisco, and the expectation that arrives with him is the kind no amount of settling-in period softens.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Racing Club will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $395.2K — a club that wants Raúl Loaiza enough to be asked twice.
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
The one award on the pitch nobody else can win. 9 games in a season in which nobody scored past him, and a career that will be measured against this one.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Matheus Bianqui scored, was marked 7.91, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Lucas Ronier wants continental football; whether Coritiba can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Marked 8.36 — 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.
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.
Marked 8.05 — 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 have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Coritiba can pretend not to have heard.
Sebastián Gómez 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 Matheus Bianqui 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.
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.
Remo next, and one man in the Coritiba dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Successful dribbles: 31. 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Renato Marques provided it, and the 8.81 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Jacy Maranhão 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.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matheus Bianqui was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Minute 88, against Criciúma, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Pedro Morisco is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Sebastián Gómez 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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Coritiba training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matheus Bianqui 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.
Something was said to Lucas Ronier and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“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.
Nobody at Coritiba 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.
Athletic Club will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Coritiba were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Two goals and a mark of 8.25 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Coritiba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Lucas Ronier has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
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 dugout21 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Paulo Tavares, on a 3‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Coritiba, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Joaquín Lavega, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.86
A mark of 7.86 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Sebastián Gómez 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.
He is 21 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.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” ENPPI had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. JP Chermont did not need any: 7.80, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Sebastián Gómez 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.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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.
At 20 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Rodrigo Rodrigues. 1‑0 against Avaí, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
8.12. 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.
In brief
SquadMatheus Bianqui falls out with a teammate over standards
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
The offer from Gabala for Tiago Cóser was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Sebastián Gómez 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.
He is 22 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Felipe Pereira 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Gabriel Costa is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 85th, and Operário Ferroviário spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Joaquín Lavega did not need any: 8.51, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Lucas Ronier wants continental football; whether Coritiba can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Words at Coritiba training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastián Gómez 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.