“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Gimnasia y Esgrima have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ismael Cortez and Gimnasia y Esgrima agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mario Moreno 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.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Ferro Carril Oeste defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Valentino Muñoz will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Gimnasia y Esgrima the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Gimnasia y Esgrima has to find a result from somewhere.
Augusto Lucero 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Liam Rey and Gimnasia y Esgrima agree another 3 years.
Nobody at Gimnasia y Esgrima 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Gimnasia y Esgrima will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
41 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Gimnasia y Esgrima lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
8 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Gimnasia y Esgrima has to find a result from somewhere.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 6 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alan Chacón signs something — a contract at Gimnasia y Esgrima or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The words a physio says slowly. 56 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.
Augusto Lucero 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Squad21 Sep 2037
Mario Moreno 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Gimnasia y Esgrima can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Gimnasia y Esgrima is running low.
“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 Gimnasia y Esgrima, and it is not being withdrawn.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 6 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 17 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
In brief
Player ratingsThe afternoon belonged to Alan Chacón
21 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.
Augusto Lucero 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.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Gimnasia y Esgrima can tell you which week it ends in.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nene 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.
Nobody at Gimnasia y Esgrima 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Gimnasia y Esgrima have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Contract settled, hands shaken, no fee changing hands. Gabriel Arias leaves Gimnasia y Esgrima the quiet way, and the wage bill breathes a little easier.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 7 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Gimnasia y Esgrima is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 22 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
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.
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Gimnasia y Esgrima they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Gimnasia y Esgrima will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Gimnasia y Esgrima is running low.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Valentín Pereyra will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Gimnasia y Esgrima the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Augusto Lucero 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.
In brief
SquadAlan Chacón has become a man the manager trusts
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Gimnasia y Esgrima can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
“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 Gimnasia y Esgrima, and it is not being withdrawn.
Augusto Lucero 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Nicolás Marino and Gimnasia y Esgrima agree another 2 years.
Nobody at Gimnasia y Esgrima 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The captaincy has been taken off Ismael Cortez. Gimnasia y Esgrima will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gimnasia y Esgrima this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Nobody at Gimnasia y Esgrima 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.