Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad23 Aug 2027
Words at Independiente training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Santiago Arias 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Independiente this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
43 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
The dugout23 Aug 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑2 Eduardo Arias left the room before anybody could ask which.
Successful dribbles: 35. 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.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Matías Molina has agreed terms with Belgrano for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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.
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.
Kevin López 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.
Independiente ran out of time with Estudiantes. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Rodrigo Rey 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 Jan 2027
Words at Independiente training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Santiago Arias 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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Emanuel Aguilera has his answer from Independiente; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
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.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Independiente. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Independiente will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
“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 Independiente, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Independiente this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Iván Morales 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Santino Viollaz and Independiente agree another 4 years.
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.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and David Ospina has written the date down.
20 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Independiente lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Rodrigo Rey 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Zurdo has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Maximiliano Fernández 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Julián Pérez has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Carlos Alberto Marino is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words at Independiente training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jonathan De Irastorza 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Independiente, and both men came out saying it was fine.
In brief
The dugoutLeonel Galván has become a man the manager trusts
54 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Independiente lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Independiente heard it as anything else.
Maximiliano Meza 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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Iván Morales 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.
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.
Nobody at Independiente 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.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Independiente. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Santiago Arias 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.
Talleres made Independiente work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Iván Morales 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.
Marked 8.11 — 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 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.” Eduardo Arias, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Independiente and Deportivo Riestra in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Iván Morales 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.
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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.07 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Joel Medina, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.16
A mark of 8.16 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Independiente this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 19 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.
Level with 92 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Independiente had all but put away. Lanús will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
“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.
Rodrigo Rey 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.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The ambition story running the other way, and the one nobody tells: a footballer asking for a smaller stage, fewer cameras and a crowd that does not turn. It is not weakness and it is very rarely reported as anything else.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Independiente hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Independiente this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The phone has started ringing about Leonel Galván again, and this time the name on the line is Avispa Fukuoka. Independiente are listening politely and promising nothing.
15 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.