Marked for Darwin Martinez
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad17 Jul 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 84 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market17 Jul 2028
“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.
Match15 Jul 2028
No end in sight to Llaneros's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Llaneros has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings17 Jul 2028
7.71, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Squad17 Jul 2028
“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.
Market17 Jul 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Llaneros is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Joel Poiso 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.
Squad17 Jul 2028
The manager makes an example of Luis Savarino
“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.
Player ratings17 Jul 2028
Successful dribbles: 18. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad12 Jun 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 125 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market12 Jun 2028
“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.
Market12 Jun 2028
Joel Poiso wants European nights
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.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Luis Moreno Quero 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.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Joel Poiso 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.
Squad12 Jun 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Match10 Jun 2028
A 1‑0 win over Zamora, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
Marked 8.13 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
Defensive actions: 17, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad28 Jun 2027
Darwin Osorio damages knee ligaments — 92 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 92 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The terraces28 Jun 2027
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 11 of the 29 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
Player ratings28 Jun 2027
Successful dribbles: 27. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad28 Jun 2027
André 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 Llaneros this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Jun 2027
The manager makes an example of Yeferson Osorio
“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.
Squad28 Jun 2027
David Rincon 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.
Market28 Jun 2027
Enmanuel Meléndez is 20, and Llaneros have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match27 Mar 2027
0‑4 to Estudiantes de Merida, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Match29 Mar 2027
Llaneros are in real trouble now
Position 15, 9 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
The terraces29 Mar 2027
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 7 of the 29 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
Squad29 Mar 2027
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Llaneros training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Roberto Gonzalez 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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Rafael Ferraresi 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.
Boardroom29 Mar 2027
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Whether it was the goalkeeper or the ten in front of him is the argument that will fill every conversation in town this week. 2 saves does not settle it either way.
Player ratings29 Mar 2027
5.27 on the card. Some afternoons a footballer looks like a man who has only just been introduced to the game, and this was one of them.