Marked for Edison Gutiérrez
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad7 Jan 2030
The season belongs to Luis Ramos
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 Deportivo Municipal have had the benefit of it.
Market7 Jan 2030
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Deportivo Municipal heard it as anything else.
Squad7 Jan 2030
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Municipal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market10 Sep 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad10 Sep 2029
Alan Cantero 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.
Squad10 Sep 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Edison Gutiérrez, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match10 Mar 2029
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 10 matches without defeat is a foundation Deportivo Municipal did not have in the autumn.
Market12 Mar 2029
Aarón Carnero hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportivo Municipal can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings12 Mar 2029
Successful dribbles: 24. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market12 Mar 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Deportivo Municipal they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad12 Mar 2029
Alan Cantero in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Deportivo Municipal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Mar 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alejandro Altuna, and the manager let it.
Player ratings12 Mar 2029
A performance of 8.20 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Match10 Mar 2029
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Player ratings12 Mar 2029
Shots: 7, not one of them in. A centre forward is paid for one thing, and on this evidence he has forgotten which thing it is.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad8 Jan 2029
Mathías Panduro: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Deportivo Municipal have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market8 Jan 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Deportivo Municipal can pretend not to have heard.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Luis Ramos 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.
Squad8 Jan 2029
42 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Market8 Jan 2029
The name of Alexander Guevara has come up in conversations Deportivo Municipal were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Boardroom8 Jan 2029
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match25 Dec 2028
Universitario refuse to drop out of the race
Position 1, 51 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Squad25 Dec 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.
Market25 Dec 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Universitario can pretend not to have heard.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Alex Valera 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.
Squad25 Dec 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Cristián Blanco and Universitario agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad25 Dec 2028
51 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Market25 Dec 2028
A conversation is coming this week. Universitario will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Market25 Dec 2028
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Ramiro Funes Mori may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.