Marked for Nicolas Ramirez
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad30 Nov 2026
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 80 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market30 Nov 2026
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Cortulua can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad30 Nov 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Kevin Giraldo and Cortulua agree another 5 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad30 Nov 2026
A row about effort at Cortulua
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kevin Romero was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad30 Nov 2026
A falling-out at Cortulua
Kevin Martinez and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Kevin Giraldo, and the manager let it.
Loan watch30 Nov 2026
“I watch every Cortulua game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Persis runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
Alfredo Montero has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Cortulua will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Market30 Nov 2026
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Cortulua know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad23 Nov 2026
A fracture rules Nicolas Ramirez out for 88 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Cortulua will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
Julian Restrepo: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Cortulua have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Alfredo Montero 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.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
The manager makes an example of David Valencia
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad23 Nov 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Erik Vásquez and Cortulua agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
Kevin Romero has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Cortulua will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad16 Nov 2026
A fracture rules Nicolas Ramirez out for 96 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Cortulua will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Gabriel Zapata: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Cortulua have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words exchanged at Cortulua
Alfredo Montero 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at Cortulua training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kevin Romero 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
12 new faces, and Cortulua are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Cortulua told Fabian Perez something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Market16 Nov 2026
Gabriel Zapata is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Cortulua has been clear about where Gabriel Zapata stands, which is more than many ever get.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Jan Vega has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Cortulua will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Market16 Nov 2026
Cortulua bring in an old head
Jonathan Lozano is 33 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad9 Nov 2026
103 days out for Nicolas Ramirez after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Cortulua will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad9 Nov 2026
A falling-out at Cortulua
Alfredo Montero and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad9 Nov 2026
A row about effort at Cortulua
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kevin Romero was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad9 Nov 2026
The medical room confirms 15 days on the sidelines for Wilmar Hurtado, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
Duvan Cordoba has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Cortulua will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Market9 Nov 2026
At 34, he has seen every situation this season can produce, twice. The legs will be managed; the head is the purchase.
Market9 Nov 2026
Cortulua bring in an old head
Diego Arismendi is 38 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Market9 Nov 2026
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alfredo Montero signs something — a contract at Cortulua or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad2 Nov 2026
A fracture rules Nicolas Ramirez out for 111 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Cortulua will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match31 Oct 2026
No end in sight to Cortulua's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Cortulua has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad2 Nov 2026
A falling-out at Cortulua
Carlos Mosquera and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad2 Nov 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Gonzalo Godoy commits to Cortulua for another 1 years.
Loan watch2 Nov 2026
“I did not go to Persis to sit and watch. I want to come back to Cortulua and fight for my place.” 4 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
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 dugout2 Nov 2026
Diego Bacca: “We have to be better”
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Market2 Nov 2026
Experience through the door at Cortulua
Gonzalo Godoy arrives at 38 with nothing left to prove and plenty left to pass on. Legs are a young man's currency; knowing where to stand never ages.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad26 Oct 2026
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 121 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match24 Oct 2026
3 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Jan Vega will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Cortulua escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Market26 Oct 2026
“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 Cortulua, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Jan Vega scores twice — 8.39
Two goals and a mark of 8.39 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match24 Oct 2026
The wait goes on for Cortulua
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.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Kevin Romero 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.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
A performance of 8.32 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of David Valencia
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Match24 Oct 2026
It needed Jan Vega to find the net to bring anything home at all: 3‑3 against Junior, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Nicolas Ramirez out for 130 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Cortulua will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market19 Oct 2026
“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 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Kevin Martinez is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Kevin Romero 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.
Match17 Oct 2026
The goals have deserted Cortulua
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Cortulua can tell you which week it ends in.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
When it matters, Jan Vega plays
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 dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Diego Bacca was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Cortulua dressing room was either.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 13. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Gabriel Zapata dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Nicolas Ramirez out for 137 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Cortulua will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market12 Oct 2026
“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 Cortulua, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad12 Oct 2026
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Squad12 Oct 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Manuel Granados commits to Cortulua for another 1 years.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Cortulua are still strangers to each other
6 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.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Julian Restrepo, and the manager let it.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
Duvan Cordoba 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 Duvan Cordoba is on it.
Market12 Oct 2026
David Montero is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Cortulua has been clear about where David Montero stands, which is more than many ever get.
Market12 Oct 2026
Cortulua bring in an old head
César Horst is 37 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match30 Sep 2026
Atletico Nacional ended it 0‑1. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
Squad5 Oct 2026
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Kevin Romero 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.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Nicolas Ramirez
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Match3 Oct 2026
0‑1 to Deportivo Cali, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad5 Oct 2026
It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 37 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
Market5 Oct 2026
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. David Montero wants continental football; whether Cortulua can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Hugo Muriel and Cortulua agree another 1 years.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match19 Sep 2026
Still nobody has beaten Cortulua
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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words exchanged at Cortulua
Alfredo Montero 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.
Match19 Sep 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Kevin Romero. 1‑0 against Independiente Medellin, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Ninety minutes of Kevin Romero at his very best
Marked 8.18. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Cortulua.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Diego Bacca on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
When it matters, Jan Vega plays
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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
One yellow too many, and a match watched from the stand. The most avoidable absence in football, and Cortulua will feel it on Saturday.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Guilherme Alves 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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The plan did not have a place for David Valencia
Nobody at Cortulua is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market10 Aug 2026
Business is business: Ivan Cardona goes
Sporting CP paid $19.5M and Cortulua took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Duvan Zapata commits to Cortulua for another 4 years.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Cortulua training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Duvan Cordoba 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Alfredo Montero 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.
The dugout10 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nicolas Ramirez, and the manager let it.
Match8 Aug 2026
Envigado left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Market10 Aug 2026
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. David Montero wants continental football; whether Cortulua can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
The dugout10 Aug 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Diego Bacca to a room that had heard them before.
Squad10 Aug 2026
The formation has left David Valencia behind
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Cortulua will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.