The Santa Cruz Chronicle
Squad6 Mar 2028
Andrey signs a new deal
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Andrey commits to Santa Cruz for another 3 years.
Squad6 Mar 2028
A falling-out at Santa Cruz
Willian Arão and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad6 Mar 2028
A move Bruno Branco would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Bruno Branco is living that version at Santa Cruz, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Balotelli 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.
Market6 Mar 2028
Santa Cruz and Willian Arão are talking past each other
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
Market6 Mar 2028
Santa Cruz sign Michel Chedid, one for the future
Michel Chedid is 20, and Santa Cruz have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
Fredy Colmán gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
Robinho 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 Santa Cruz, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
Juan Sebastián Ramírez gets picked when it counts
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 Juan Sebastián Ramírez is on it.
In brief
- Match Santa Cruz in the hunt for Europe
- Market Santa Cruz shop where it costs nothing
- The dugout Eron has been promised minutes