Marked for Daniel Müller
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Sep 2030
A fracture rules Egor Lunikhin out for 56 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Molodechno will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad16 Sep 2030
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Molodechno may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad16 Sep 2030
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molodechno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad16 Sep 2030
A move Egor Lunikhin would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Egor Lunikhin is living that version at Molodechno, and it tends to show in the first month.
Boardroom16 Sep 2030
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Market16 Sep 2030
He is 20, and nobody at Molodechno signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market11 Jun 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Barranquilla can pretend not to have heard.
Squad11 Jun 2029
Jhon Moreno: 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.” Barranquilla have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Match9 Jun 2029
The unbeaten run reaches 6. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad11 Jun 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Barranquilla this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings11 Jun 2029
Successful dribbles: 15. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad11 Jun 2029
“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.
Squad11 Jun 2029
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.
Player ratings11 Jun 2029
Defensive actions: 14, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Market11 Jun 2029
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Manuel Santos has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Barranquilla.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad26 Mar 2029
Jorge Akamine damages knee ligaments — 36 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 36 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.
Market26 Mar 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Barranquilla they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad26 Mar 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Barranquilla this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match24 Mar 2029
Real Santander left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad26 Mar 2029
The manager makes an example of Jhoynner Lozano
“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.
Squad26 Mar 2029
Sebastián Caballero 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Mar 2029
A knee injury of the worst kind for Jorge Akamine
58 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Barranquilla lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market5 Mar 2029
“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.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Alejandro Leiva 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.
Match3 Mar 2029
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Jhoynner Lozano. 1‑0 against Depor, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings5 Mar 2029
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.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Férney Angulo 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.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Jhon Moreno is the division's best young player this month
At 21 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Barranquilla will try very hard not to make too much of it.
Player ratings5 Mar 2029
7.18, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Barranquilla had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
Boardroom5 Mar 2029
The numbers do not look good at Barranquilla
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad19 Feb 2029
A knee injury of the worst kind for Jorge Akamine
72 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Barranquilla lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market19 Feb 2029
“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 Feb 2029
Jhon Moreno: 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.” Barranquilla have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Juan David Ríos 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.
Squad19 Feb 2029
“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.
Player ratings19 Feb 2029
18 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match20 Jan 2029
7 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.
Squad22 Jan 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Barranquilla may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market22 Jan 2029
“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.
Boardroom22 Jan 2029
9 academy players handed senior numbers at Barranquilla
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Squad22 Jan 2029
Words at Barranquilla training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jorge Akamine 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.
Market22 Jan 2029
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Carlos Rios has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market22 Jan 2029
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Gabriel Torres has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market22 Jan 2029
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Juan Perez has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Squad22 Jan 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Daniel Castillo, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom25 Dec 2028
The scrutiny sharpens at Barranquilla
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Barranquilla is running low.
Market25 Dec 2028
Llaneros come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Barranquilla did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Juan David Ríos 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.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Words at Barranquilla training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jorge Akamine 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.
Squad25 Dec 2028
The manager makes an example of Jackie Muñoz
“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.
Market25 Dec 2028
The clock does Juan David Ríos’s negotiating for him
7 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Barranquilla could ask drops and the wages Juan David Ríos can ask rise.