Marked for Ignacio Peluffo
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market3 Jul 2028
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Sol de America people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Ramon Peralta breaks a bone — 16 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 16 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Transfer targets3 Jul 2028
$910.0K settles it between the clubs for Ricardo Marecos
Cerro Porteno have accepted the money. What Sol de America do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Player ratings3 Jul 2028
No sign of nerves from Ignacio Peluffo at 21 — 7.70
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ignacio Peluffo did not need any: 7.70, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Market3 Jul 2028
Only the photograph left for Luis Rolón
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Luis Rolón will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sol de America the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market3 Jul 2028
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.
Boardroom3 Jul 2028
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.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Gonzalo Silva 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.
Transfer targets3 Jul 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Libertad have kept their man, and Sol de America go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market12 Jun 2028
“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 The request is on a desk at Sol de America, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market12 Jun 2028
The offer from Pastoreo for Hugo Gaona 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.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Gonzalo Silva and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets12 Jun 2028
Sol de America asked and Nacional said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Match10 Jun 2028
A 2‑1 win over Sportivo San Lorenzo, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
The terraces12 Jun 2028
He is 21 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
The dugout12 Jun 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Joel Jiménez, and the manager let it.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
A mark of 7.86, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Transfer targets12 Jun 2028
A loan move for Junior Paredes is in the works
Sol de America have made the call to Cerro Porteno. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market24 Apr 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sol de America can pretend not to have heard.
Squad24 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sol de America this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Ignacio Peluffo gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Ignacio Peluffo has just signed for Sol de America, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Gonzalo Silva 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.
Player ratings24 Apr 2028
Gastón Benedetti was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.00. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Match24 Apr 2028
Half the programme played, position 9, 12 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Sol de America are still strangers to each other
5 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.
In brief
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The dugout
The manager’s verdict
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The dugout
Luis Rolón gets it from the manager
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The dugout
When it matters, Pablo Fernández plays