“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 The request is on a desk at Union Magdalena, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jacobo Escobar 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Union Magdalena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Jose Falcao after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Jimmy Congo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 The request is on a desk at Union Magdalena, and it is not being withdrawn.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Jesús Peñaloza is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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.
A point taken on 90 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jacobo Escobar 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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Union Magdalena are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Jose Falcao after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Junior in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Daniel Mera trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Jimmy Congo