Marked for Guillermo Ramirez
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Jun 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Arneth González
102 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Club America lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 100 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market19 Jun 2028
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Club America have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Transfer targets19 Jun 2028
The clubs have shaken hands with Santos Laguna; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Transfer targets19 Jun 2028
Club America asked and Queretaro said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Lautaro Valenti 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 Jun 2028
Guillermo Ramirez is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Market19 Jun 2028
Business is business: Miguel Borja goes
Pachuca paid $110.0K and Club America took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Market19 Jun 2028
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Club America have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets7 Feb 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Pumas UNAM have kept their man, and Club America go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market7 Feb 2028
Tigres come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Club America did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Player ratings7 Feb 2028
Henry Martín, 35, rolls back the years — 8.02
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.02 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Henry Martín: 10 seasons and counting
428 appearances across 10 seasons in one shirt. Careers like that are not built on purpose any more, and Club America know exactly what they have.
Market7 Feb 2028
“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 Club America, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
Club America close the window on a squad of their own making
6 in and 3 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Market7 Feb 2028
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Club America heard it as anything else.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Henry Martín
17 goals and a season average of 7.29 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Lennard Maloney 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings1 Nov 2027
Two goals and a mark of 8.92 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings1 Nov 2027
0 on the scoresheet on his first appearance and a mark of 7.30 beside it. Most debuts are got through; this one was enjoyed, by him and by everybody watching it.
Player ratings1 Nov 2027
Marked 7.68 at 21, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Player ratings1 Nov 2027
Successful dribbles: 26. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match30 Oct 2027
Whatever happens, Club America do not lose
8 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Market1 Nov 2027
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Club America heard it as anything else.
Squad1 Nov 2027
Alexis Gutiérrez 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 terraces1 Nov 2027
He is 21 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.