17 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Mallorca lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The offer went to Atlético Madrid this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
“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 The request is on a desk at Mallorca, and it is not being withdrawn.
The name of Mario De Luis has come up in conversations Mallorca were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Pablo Muñoz has just signed for Mallorca, and for once the answer mattered.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Mallorca is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $5.7M — a club that wants Alejandro Mestanza enough to be asked twice.
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.
$60.7M settles it between the clubs for Gilberto Mora
Guadalajara have accepted the money. What Mallorca do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
24 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Mallorca lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Mallorca people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Mallorca can pretend not to have heard.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Mallorca can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Mallorca 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jon Martín was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. David Marini is living that version at Mallorca, and it tends to show in the first month.
The words a physio says slowly. 32 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.
“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 Mallorca, and it is not being withdrawn.
Atlético Madrid have accepted the money. What Mallorca do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Everything was agreed with Real Sociedad and then the doctor spoke. Mallorca have walked away from a signing on the advice of somebody who never saw him play, which is how it is supposed to work.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Mallorca people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The chase for Khalid Noureddine ended with $1.5M changing hands and CE Europa out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Maroan Sannadi 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.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $5.7M — a club that wants Alejandro Mestanza enough to be asked twice.