“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” ABC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. ABC will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what ABC can pretend not to have heard.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at ABC can tell you which week it ends in.
Wellington Carvalho 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lima 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.
34 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. ABC lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” ABC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether ABC can give him that is a question about the club, not about 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 ABC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Vila Nova paid $320.0K and ABC took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gimnasia La Plata have kept their man, and ABC go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The enquiry everybody at ABC was hoping would not arrive has arrived. He has never pretended he did not want to go back, and now there is somewhere to go back to.
Squad20 Dec 2027
Luiz Fernando 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 ABC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation ABC are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
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 Ronaldy is on it.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Wallyson’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and ABC needing him to play as if none of it matters.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Wellington Carvalho signs something — a contract at ABC or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Position 5 on 59 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Luiz Fernando has written the date down.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at ABC would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Randerson’s exile
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Zé Lucas did not need any: 8.24, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
He is 19 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.
Marked 8.50. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at ABC.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Bruno Leite 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.
Oziel and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Gabriel Freitas, on a 2‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what ABC can pretend not to have heard.
Matías Daniele 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. Bruno Leite 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 19 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. ABC will try not to make too much of it.
Squad6 Sep 2027
A place in the month's best eleven for Dudu Mandai
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Dudu Mandai has come out of that comparison in the side, and ABC have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
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 hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Zé Lucas did not need any: 8.37, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bruno Leite was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Vasco da Gama have accepted the money. What ABC do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Add another name to the list: União have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Oziel. The answer from ABC has not changed — yet.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Lucas Souza 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.