Marked for Gerardo Larraya
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad3 Dec 2035
A knee injury of the worst kind for Elson Mosquera
88 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Valledupar lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Boardroom3 Dec 2035
$575.1K of the owner's money at Valledupar
The shortfall was covered from upstairs again. Supporters are entitled to be relieved and entitled to ask what happens the month it is not, and both feelings usually arrive together.
Squad3 Dec 2035
A row about effort at Valledupar
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Egor Kress was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets3 Dec 2035
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad3 Dec 2035
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valledupar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market3 Dec 2035
No place for José Mejía in the plan
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” José Mejía has his answer from Valledupar; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Market3 Dec 2035
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Wilmar Bacca is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market3 Dec 2035
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Camilo Arias 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.
Market3 Dec 2035
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Jefferson Cardona 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad23 Jul 2035
A knee injury of the worst kind for Drissa Camara
91 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Alianza Petrolera lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Transfer targets23 Jul 2035
Alianza Petrolera and Atletico Nacional have settled on $810.0K. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
Match21 Jul 2035
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around Alianza Petrolera are no longer polite ones.
Market23 Jul 2035
“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 Alianza Petrolera, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom23 Jul 2035
Deadline passes with 1 signed and 4 gone
That is the business done at Alianza Petrolera until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Market23 Jul 2035
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Joaquín Postigo wants continental football; whether Alianza Petrolera can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Transfer targets23 Jul 2035
$150.0K on the table at Patriotas. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Market23 Jul 2035
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Cortulua moved on, Gerardo Larraya reports back to Alianza Petrolera, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Squad23 Jul 2035
Juan David Delgado 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad16 Jul 2035
Drissa Camara damages knee ligaments — 98 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 98 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.
Market16 Jul 2035
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Alianza Petrolera people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market16 Jul 2035
“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 Alianza Petrolera, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market16 Jul 2035
“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.
Match14 Jul 2035
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Alianza Petrolera are no longer polite ones.
Transfer targets16 Jul 2035
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Alianza Petrolera have done the hard part with Jaguares, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Market16 Jul 2035
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Nicolás Palavecino wants continental football; whether Alianza Petrolera can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Transfer targets16 Jul 2035
Atletico Nacional wanted more than $750.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Squad16 Jul 2035
Mateus Cantarelli 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom2 Jul 2035
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Alianza Petrolera
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
Boardroom2 Jul 2035
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.
Match2 Jul 2035
Every point is an argument now for Alianza Petrolera
Position 18 and 19 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Market2 Jul 2035
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Depor waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Alianza Petrolera is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Player ratings2 Jul 2035
Drissa Camara pops up at the right end — 7.51
7.51, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Market2 Jul 2035
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Alianza Petrolera can pretend not to have heard.
Market2 Jul 2035
Only the photograph left for Yeison Murillo
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Yeison Murillo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Alianza Petrolera the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Transfer targets2 Jul 2035
Everything agreed with Santa Fe, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad2 Jul 2035
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Juan David Delgado and Alianza Petrolera agree another 4 years.