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 Bogota can pretend not to have heard.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and David Reyes reports back to Bogota with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Cristián Mosquera 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.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Words at Bogota training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kevin Castro 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.
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.
The borrowing is past what the bank agreed, which is the line where a debt stops being how football is financed and starts being a problem. Every phone-in in this town will quote the figure for the next five years.
Squad23 Jul 2029
The manager has not finished forgetting Kevin Salazar's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“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 The request is on a desk at Bogota, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Anderson Acevedo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Bogota the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bogota this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad16 Jul 2029
Kevin Castro 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Brian Mendoza trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bogota can pretend not to have heard.
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this 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 Bogota this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Kevin Castro 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 shortfall was covered from upstairs again. Supporters are entitled to be relieved and entitled to ask what happens the month it is not, and both feelings usually arrive together.
The phone has started ringing about Luis Rivas again, and this time the name on the line is Depor. Bogota are listening politely and promising nothing.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bogota can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bogota this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 May 2029
Kevin Castro 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 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.
The manager has a list and the board has a condition attached to it. That is not a crisis — half of football works this way — but it decides which of the two of them gets his way in August.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bogota can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bogota this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Bogota training over how hard people work
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bogota 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.” Bogota have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
In brief
SquadKevin Castro falls out with a teammate over standards
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bogota this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.