Marked for Octavio Alfonso
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Octavio Alfonso is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Diego Morel 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 Oct 2026
A move Orlín Barreto 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. Orlín Barreto is living that version at Rubio Nu, and it tends to show in the first month.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match12 Aug 2026
The small margins put Rubio Nu out
Out, 0‑1 to Sportivo San Lorenzo, and the long argument about which of the small moments decided it. The league is all there is now, and everybody knows it.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Diego Morel 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.
Match15 Aug 2026
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout17 Aug 2026
Diego Morel 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Rubio Nu know which stage they are at.
Market17 Aug 2026
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Squad17 Aug 2026
14 new faces, and Rubio Nu are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout17 Aug 2026
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 Diego Acosta left the room before anybody could ask which.
Squad17 Aug 2026
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad3 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Brian Blasi and Rubio Nu agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Match1 Aug 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Julio González. 1‑0 against Deportivo Santani, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Rubio Nu
Octavio Alfonso 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
36 months and counting on Brian Blasi
Still no offer on the table, and Brian Blasi’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Rubio Nu training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pedro Álvarez 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 dugout3 Aug 2026
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Diego Acosta could afford to be generous.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Squad3 Aug 2026
A strip of cloth that decides nothing on the pitch and tells the dressing room whose opinion counts. The manager has made a statement without making one.
Market3 Aug 2026
Contract settled, hands shaken, no fee changing hands. Tomás Canteros leaves Rubio Nu the quiet way, and the wage bill breathes a little easier.