Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Cartagena they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Cristian Espinoza wants continental football; whether Cartagena can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Cartagena, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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 Sebastián Martelli has written the date down.
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
In brief
SquadAlex Freeman is training like a man with a point to make
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Cartagena is running low.
“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 The request is on a desk at Cartagena, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Marco Carrascal will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Cartagena the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cartagena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 May 2027
Words at Cartagena training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aridane Hernández 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Cartagena, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Cartagena will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cartagena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words at Cartagena training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aridane Hernández 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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Fernando Prieto could afford to be generous.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Cartagena they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pedro Álvaro was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 37, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Pablo Moyá had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 22 signed and 0 gone
That is the business done at Cartagena 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.
The offer from Zamora for Luca Lohr 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.
Cartagena had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Boca Juniors, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Dani Sánchez 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.
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.
12 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.