He arrived for a fee and leaves for a fraction of it. $1.2M of what Fortaleza paid for Juninho is money the club will not see again, and the boardroom will be asked about it for two seasons.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 5 arrived, 13 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
“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 The request is on a desk at Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 14 combined actions and a mark of 6.68, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
$80.0K was the most the club would pay and América de Natal were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vitinho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 33 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Fortaleza is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Fortaleza asked and São Paulo said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Fortaleza have done the hard part with Botafogo-SP, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $160.0K — a club that wants Fausto Rivero enough to be asked twice.
Adem Zorgane 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.
Squad9 Jul 2035
Words at Fortaleza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vitinho 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 paperwork is done long before the player is. Renzo Cupla has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Fortaleza have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
“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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Fortaleza have done the hard part with Santos, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Fortaleza have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
13 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Fortaleza asked and América de Natal said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Fortaleza will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fortaleza they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Adem Zorgane 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.
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.
9 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
At 35, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 55 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
7 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 rules permit it and it stings anyway. Denival has agreed terms with ABC for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fortaleza they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Fortaleza will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fortaleza they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Adem Zorgane 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.
Squad12 Mar 2035
Brian Aguirre 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 has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Brian Aguirre signs something — a contract at Fortaleza or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutRicardinho asks for a word with the manager
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Fortaleza will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Allex will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fortaleza the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad26 Feb 2035
Words at Fortaleza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Brian Aguirre 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.
6 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Fortaleza know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 73 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Fortaleza is running low.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fortaleza is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Fortaleza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Feb 2035
Brian Aguirre 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 demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Bruno Machado is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Léo Naldi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The money the manager was told he had is now money the manager used to have. $11.4M, gone from the table without a statement, and a dressing room that understands what it means.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 80 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alisson Soares will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fortaleza the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Adem Zorgane and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad29 Jan 2035
Brian Aguirre 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.
5 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.
19 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Fortaleza lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Fortaleza will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fortaleza they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Day 38 of the vacancy. Candidates have been priced, sounded out and quietly ruled out — and the caretaker’s win ratio is becoming an argument all by itself.
Fortaleza had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Chacarita Juniors, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Brian Aguirre was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Fortaleza asked and Estudiantes said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Four paragraphs on the club website, none of them about football. The board thanked him, wished him well, and had the search under way before the page went up.
Not an interim appointment — an institution with an empty coaching office. Somebody unfamiliar will run the sessions this week, and the question of how a club gets into this state is one the board will be asked and will not answer.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Fortaleza will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Somebody picks the team on Saturday. This week it is me, and that is as far as I have thought.” No promises were made in either direction, which is how these usually begin.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fortaleza is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Fortaleza will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jonathan will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fortaleza the goodbyes have quietly begun.
5 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Brian Aguirre was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Fortaleza is running low.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jonathan will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fortaleza the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bruno Machado was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fortaleza they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
This is not rotation. Juninho has not been in the manager's plans for some time, and nobody at Fortaleza is pretending otherwise.
Squad2 Oct 2034
Words at Fortaleza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Brian Aguirre 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 an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.07 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Thiago Gonçalves will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fortaleza 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 Fortaleza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad25 Sep 2034
Words at Fortaleza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Brian Aguirre 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Adem Zorgane. 1‑0 against Corinthians, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
30 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Fortaleza lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jonathan will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fortaleza the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Brian Aguirre was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fortaleza is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Fortaleza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Alisson Soares has agreed terms with Inter de Limeira for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
7.78, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Fortaleza had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
The dugout28 Aug 2034
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.” Interim Coach, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Chapecoense waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Fortaleza is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Fluminense for Juninho 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.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.08 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Fortaleza asked and Botafogo said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Thiago Gonçalves 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 club looked outside for a month, found nothing it preferred, and handed the job to the man who had been doing it anyway. He knows the building; now he has to prove he knows the rest.
“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 Fortaleza, and it is not being withdrawn.
1 for Jonás Ravano, marked 7.58, 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.
Adem Zorgane 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.
Squad22 May 2034
Words at Fortaleza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Brian Aguirre 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Luca Meirelles. 2‑0 against Portuguesa, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
In brief
Player ratingsAndrés Gómez was on a different afternoon to everybody else
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
It has nothing to do with his form and everything to do with how the squad was assembled. He will train all week with a group he is not permitted to play for, which is a strange way to spend a season.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Fortaleza know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
9 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Brian Aguirre was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Fortaleza, and both men came out saying it was fine.
His past walked in ahead of him. Players who have been where he has been get a hearing in a dressing room before they have earned one, and he has it for as long as his form does.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
8 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Welliton Matheus trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Jonathan has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Interim Coach has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fortaleza can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fortaleza is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Fortaleza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Fortaleza are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Every squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Andrés Gómez is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fortaleza is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Adem Zorgane 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Fortaleza, another week without a signature from Andrés Gómez.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Fortaleza are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.