Two goals and a mark of 9.61 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings3 Jun 2030
A brace, and Gino Podestá takes the afternoon — 8.26
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Gino Podestá provided it, and the 8.26 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 The request is on a desk at Estudiantes, and it is not being withdrawn.
Gabriel Alanís 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Gonzalo Maffini and Estudiantes agree another 2 years.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. San Martín SJ have kept their man, and Estudiantes go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Marked 8.45 — 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.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Estudiantes can pretend not to have heard.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Benjamín Sand scored in the 86th minute, Ferro Carril Oeste had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Estudiantes took the lot.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Benjamín Sand did not need any: 7.88, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Successful dribbles: 15. 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.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Iván Álvarez could afford to be generous.
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 Matías Ruiz Díaz is on it.
Successful dribbles: 30. 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Estudiantes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 4 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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.
Luis Ferreyra 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.
Nobody at Estudiantes 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Abdullah Hassan was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
What was a back-page link has become a chant, and the chant is not friendly. Estudiantes would rather it were settled quietly, and it has stopped being quiet.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Javier Ferreira will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Estudiantes the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Words at Estudiantes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tobías Leiva 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.
Rosario Central 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.
Luis Ferreyra 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.
Nobody at Estudiantes 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Estudiantes, another week without a signature from Facundo Cobos.
Words at Estudiantes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tobías Leiva 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Miguel Ángel Ortiz and Estudiantes agree another 3 years.
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 Matías Ruiz Díaz is on it.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Benjamín Sand did not need any: 8.39, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Facundo Cobos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Player ratings27 Aug 2029
Siro Rosané was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.14. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Estudiantes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.