The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Sergiu Nedelcearu was one of the reasons people came, and $370.0K does not replace that by itself.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pandurii can pretend not to have heard.
The phone has started ringing about Ciprian Hagi again, and this time the name on the line is Everton. Pandurii are listening politely and promising nothing.
Simão Bertelli 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Nicusor Moldovan has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pandurii this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Pandurii know it.
In brief
SquadWords at Pandurii training over how hard people work
Sergiu Bancu 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
“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 The request is on a desk at Pandurii, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pandurii this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Pandurii, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pandurii this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Alejandro Sanchez has just signed for Pandurii, and for once the answer mattered.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Gabriel Marín did not need any: 8.03, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cortulua this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Juan Manuel Valencia and Cortulua agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
A 2‑1 win over Deportes Tolima, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Gabriel Marín has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Gabriel Marín, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.95
A mark of 7.95 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cortulua this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Alejandro Sanchez and Cortulua agree another 3 years.
“I watch every Cortulua game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Deportes Tolima runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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. Cortulua will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Edwin Uribe 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Oscar Gomez wants continental football; whether Cortulua can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Oscar Gomez 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Richard Santos has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Marked 8.26. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Cortulua.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Cortulua training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Juan Martín Aguirre 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.