Marked for Nicolás Abarca
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces6 Aug 2029
The mood at Magallanes has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Squad6 Aug 2029
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Magallanes will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad6 Aug 2029
Antonio Díaz 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 Magallanes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad6 Aug 2029
Words at Magallanes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Diego Fernández 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.
Boardroom6 Aug 2029
The owner puts $338.8K into Magallanes
This is money that keeps the lights on rather than money that buys a centre-half, and the difference is the whole story. A club funded by its owner rather than by its football has exactly one conversation left ahead of it.
Transfer targets6 Aug 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Colo-Colo have kept their man, and Magallanes go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Match4 Aug 2029
0‑1 to Deportes Temuco, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Boardroom6 Aug 2029
The embargo bars a fee being paid for a player, whatever the manager thinks the squad needs. Every rumour printed about this club between now and its lifting is a rumour about a deal that cannot happen.
Squad6 Aug 2029
Juan David Altamiranda is the division's best young player this month
At 20 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Magallanes will try very hard not to make too much of it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad23 Jul 2029
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Magallanes will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match21 Jul 2029
The drought breaks for Magallanes
14 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and San Marcos de Arica were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Boardroom23 Jul 2029
Magallanes close the window on a squad of their own making
1 in and 13 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Antonio Díaz 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.
Player ratings23 Jul 2029
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 14 actions, 7.07, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Words at Magallanes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Diego Fernández 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.
Transfer targets23 Jul 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Colo-Colo have kept their man, and Magallanes go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Boardroom23 Jul 2029
152% of the income goes out in wages at Magallanes
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Match21 Jul 2029
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Luis Riveros. 1‑0 against San Marcos de Arica, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
In brief
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Player ratings
The afternoon belonged to Antonio Díaz
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The dugout
The manager’s verdict
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The dugout
The team sheet said everything about Nicolás Abarca
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match14 Jul 2029
14 matches without a win for Magallanes
The run now stands at 14, and the questions being asked around Magallanes are no longer polite ones.
Squad16 Jul 2029
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 127 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match16 Jul 2029
13 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Market16 Jul 2029
“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 Magallanes, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market16 Jul 2029
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Magallanes have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The dugout16 Jul 2029
Nicolás Abarca: 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.” Magallanes have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad16 Jul 2029
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Market16 Jul 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Magallanes they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad16 Jul 2029
Antonio Díaz and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom4 Jun 2029
Luis Davila has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Magallanes can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Match2 Jun 2029
No end in sight to Magallanes's wait for a win
8 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Magallanes has to find a result from somewhere.
Boardroom4 Jun 2029
Pressure builds in the Magallanes boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Boardroom4 Jun 2029
Emergency meeting at Magallanes
The whole football department in one room on a weekday morning. Nothing was announced afterwards, which is what a board announces when it has run out of patience.
Market4 Jun 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 Magallanes can pretend not to have heard.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Antonio Díaz 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.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Words at Magallanes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Diego Fernández 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.
Transfer targets4 Jun 2029
Magallanes asked and Coquimbo Unido said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Match2 Jun 2029
Unión San Felipe left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match17 Mar 2029
The wait goes on for Magallanes
36 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.
The terraces19 Mar 2029
Anger at Magallanes spills outside the ground
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.
Match14 Mar 2029
The small margins put Magallanes out
Out, 1‑2 to Santiago Wanderers, and the long argument about which of the small moments decided it. The league is all there is now, and everybody knows it.
Market19 Mar 2029
Only the photograph left for Yojhan Neira
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Yojhan Neira will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Magallanes the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad19 Mar 2029
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings19 Mar 2029
Successful dribbles: 22. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Luis Riveros 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 Magallanes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Diego Fernández 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.
Market19 Mar 2029
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Juan David Altamiranda has his answer from Magallanes; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market29 Jan 2029
“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 Magallanes, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market29 Jan 2029
Emiliano Ramos has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Magallanes they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Luis Riveros and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Words at Magallanes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Antonio Díaz 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.
Market29 Jan 2029
He is 20, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
Squad29 Jan 2029
The formation has left Hugo González behind
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Magallanes will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Yojhan Neira has had enough of the bench
“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 Magallanes will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
The dugout29 Jan 2029
The manager has not finished forgetting Santiago D'abarno'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.
The dugout29 Jan 2029
Facundo Coelli knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Magallanes, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match25 Nov 2027
2‑1 against Deportivo Tachira, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
Player ratings29 Nov 2027
A brace, and Tobías Reinhart takes the afternoon — 8.23
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Tobías Reinhart provided it, and the 8.23 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Squad29 Nov 2027
At 19 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.
Squad29 Nov 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Universidad de Chile this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Nov 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Israel Poblete was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout29 Nov 2027
The team sheet said everything about Nicolás Ramírez
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Nicolás Ramírez.
The dugout29 Nov 2027
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Diego Osorio could afford to be generous.
The dugout29 Nov 2027
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 Nicolás Ramírez is on it.