Marked for Valentín Gradín
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad9 Jun 2031
Nahuel Curcio is in the form of his life
A season average of 7.61 with 29 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Match4 Jun 2031
Colón out of the cup
Boca Juniors ended it 0‑5. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
The terraces9 Jun 2031
Anger at Colón spills outside the ground
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Squad9 Jun 2031
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings9 Jun 2031
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.66, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
The dugout9 Jun 2031
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Market9 Jun 2031
The bid was some way short and Colón did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
The terraces9 Jun 2031
Colón are taken apart by Boca Juniors — and the town wants answers
It finished 0-5. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
Market9 Jun 2031
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match17 May 2031
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 4‑0 against Morón, and it could have been more.
Squad19 May 2031
Nahuel Curcio is in the form of his life
A season average of 7.55 with 25 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Player ratings19 May 2031
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.04, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings19 May 2031
Two goals and a mark of 8.67 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market19 May 2031
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad19 May 2031
Tempers go at Colón
Nahuel Curcio 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.
Match17 May 2031
Nobody wins at Colón
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Market19 May 2031
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Colón has been clear about where Federico Rasmussen stands, which is more than many ever get.
The dugout19 May 2031
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.” Diego Villalba, on a 4‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad31 Mar 2031
The match ball belongs to Nahuel Curcio, whose 4 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Match29 Mar 2031
4‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Match29 Mar 2031
Still nobody has beaten Colón
The unbeaten run reaches 8. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad31 Mar 2031
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Colón this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 Mar 2031
Nahuel Curcio is in the form of his life
A season average of 7.25 with 13 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Match29 Mar 2031
Another one collected away from home
3 on the bounce on the road for Colón. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Player ratings31 Mar 2031
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout31 Mar 2031
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Diego Villalba kept it short after the 4‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Market31 Mar 2031
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Valentín Gradín has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Colón.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad30 Dec 2030
A knee injury of the worst kind for Matías Blázquez
119 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Colón lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market30 Dec 2030
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Colón people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market30 Dec 2030
Freddy Molina has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Colón they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market30 Dec 2030
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market30 Dec 2030
“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 Colón, and it is not being withdrawn.
The dugout30 Dec 2030
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Transfer targets30 Dec 2030
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Colón have done the hard part with Estudiantes, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Transfer targets30 Dec 2030
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Gimnasia La Plata keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad30 Dec 2030
Tempers go at Colón
Nahuel Curcio 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 Dec 2030
133 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Colón lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad16 Dec 2030
Not a month, not a run of form — a whole season of being the best 21-year-old anybody in this division could put on a pitch. This is the honour that gets mentioned for the rest of his career.
Market16 Dec 2030
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Colón is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market16 Dec 2030
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Colón can pretend not to have heard.
Market16 Dec 2030
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Colón people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Boardroom16 Dec 2030
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Julio Patiño has agreed terms with Atlético Tucumán for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Market16 Dec 2030
The phone has started ringing about Valentín Gradín again, and this time the name on the line is Gimnasia La Plata. Colón are listening politely and promising nothing.
Transfer targets16 Dec 2030
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.
Squad16 Dec 2030
A row about effort at Colón
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Freddy Molina was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market8 Apr 2030
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Colón is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market8 Apr 2030
“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 Colón, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad8 Apr 2030
7 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
Player ratings8 Apr 2030
Marked 7.83 at 21, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Player ratings8 Apr 2030
Successful dribbles: 24. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match6 Apr 2030
The wait goes on for Colón
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.
Squad8 Apr 2030
A falling-out at Colón
Juan Pablo Plada and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad8 Apr 2030
Words at Colón training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Agustín Toledo 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.
Match6 Apr 2030
Colón rescue it on 86 minutes
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 86. Newell's Old Boys had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market14 Jan 2030
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Colón is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Transfer targets14 Jan 2030
Colón asked and Lanús said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Market14 Jan 2030
“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.
The dugout14 Jan 2030
Enzo Galizzi gets picked when it counts
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 Enzo Galizzi is on it.
Market14 Jan 2030
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Alan Bonansea’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout14 Jan 2030
Valentín Gradín asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad7 Jan 2030
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Colón will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Transfer targets7 Jan 2030
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.
Boardroom7 Jan 2030
Belts tighten at Colón
The accounts are being read more closely than the results. Wages before ambition is the order of business now, and the manager has been told so.
Transfer targets7 Jan 2030
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Colón will try again when the window opens; Independiente may not be selling by then.
Market7 Jan 2030
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Colón, another week without a signature from Mateo Aguilar.
Squad7 Jan 2030
Colón will explain it as a decision about the team, and it may well be one. A dressing room has never once read it that way.
The dugout7 Jan 2030
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.
Squad7 Jan 2030
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Colón will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Squad7 Jan 2030
Not a new contract, not a new number: a new place in the manager’s thinking, which is the only promotion in football that actually matters. Valentino Albornoz has moved up it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Boardroom17 Dec 2029
Colón lift the trophy
The season a town measures the next twenty against. The trophy comes home with the squad, and the route through the streets was agreed days ago.
Boardroom17 Dec 2029
Up they go: Colón promoted
Confirmed, mathematical, and a town awake all night. Whatever else the season contained, it finishes a division higher than it started.
Market17 Dec 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Colón people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Squad17 Dec 2029
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Colón have had the benefit of it.
Boardroom17 Dec 2029
Aldosivi will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Ezequiel Costa has pre-agreed a move to Colón, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Transfer targets17 Dec 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Independiente have kept their man, and Colón go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad17 Dec 2029
Lucas Cuffia in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Colón this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets17 Dec 2029
Atlético Tucumán have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Transfer targets17 Dec 2029
A loan move for Agustín Franco is in the works
Colón have made the call to Atlético Tucumán. 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
Upbeat
Transfer targets10 Dec 2029
The clubs have shaken hands with Independiente; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Market10 Dec 2029
Defensa y Justicia pay $830.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Boardroom10 Dec 2029
Colón counting the cost
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Colón now.
Market10 Dec 2029
Defensa y Justicia pay $150.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Transfer targets10 Dec 2029
Colón asked and Atlético Tucumán said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Market10 Dec 2029
The name of Lautaro Aguirre has come up in conversations Colón were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The dugout10 Dec 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Benicio Sánchez Coria, and the manager let it.
Squad10 Dec 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Colón can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Squad10 Dec 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Valentín Gradín commits to Colón for another 3 years.