17 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Racing Santander lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings15 Oct 2029
A brace, and Andrés Martín takes the afternoon — 8.53
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Andrés Martín provided it, and the 8.53 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
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.
Squad15 Oct 2029
Jorge Salinas 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
51 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Racing Santander lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Racing Santander will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Racing Santander have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Racing Santander are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Giorgi Guliashvili wants continental football; whether Racing Santander can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
“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 Racing Santander hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Mario García damages knee ligaments — 112 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 112 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 109 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Racing Santander have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“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 Racing Santander 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 Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Íñigo Vicente 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén López 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.
He has had enough of the noise. Whether Racing Santander can be a quieter place for him, or whether the only cure is a move somewhere the phone-ins are gentler, is a question for the next few months.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
23 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén López 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.
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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Dmytro Bogdanov. 1‑0 against Real Sociedad B, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Íñigo Vicente 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén López 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 no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad18 Dec 2028
Jorge Salinas 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 18 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jorge Salinas 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 needed Kelian Baruti Liamba to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Mirandés, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
10 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
There were 7 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 ratings25 Sep 2028
Sergio Martínez, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.76
A mark of 8.76 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jorge Delgado 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Endrick has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Endrick at his very best
The words a physio says slowly. 37 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Racing Santander will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Jorge Salinas is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Racing Santander moved before anybody else could: a new deal for Gabriel Gil, agreed quietly and announced loudly. Boards extend managers for many reasons; the good one is the one this looks like.
Endrick 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.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Ignacio Giménez 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Andrés Martín has improved at 29, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Álvaro Mantilla 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 words a physio says slowly. 67 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Rubén López wants continental football; whether Racing Santander can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Racing Santander can pretend not to have heard.
Íñigo Vicente 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Álvaro Mantilla 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Sergio Martínez and Racing Santander agree another 5 years.