Enzo Silcan 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.
Squad2 Apr 2029
Words at Almagro training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gino Barbieri 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.
Something was said to Claudio Salto and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Almagro can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Gonzalo Asis’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Almagro needing him to play as if none of it matters.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Gino Barbieri signs something — a contract at Almagro or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
They sit in position 10 and they will be waiting. Away form is where a season shows its true character, and this side has a point to make about its own.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager plants his flag on Claudio Salto
The words a physio says slowly. 24 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 The request is on a desk at Almagro, and it is not being withdrawn.
It finished 0-3. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
Nicolás Calero and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad12 Mar 2029
Words at Almagro training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gino Barbieri 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Franco Ponce after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Almagro will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Gino Barbieri 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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Almagro have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 68 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
$37.0K was the most the club would pay and River Plate were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Gino Barbieri 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Almagro know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 75 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Almagro have had the benefit of it.
The deal with Nueva Chicago is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almagro this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
$37.0K on the table at River Plate. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 96 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Gino Barbieri 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 mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Almagro are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Almagro know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Joel Orlando 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gino Barbieri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Almagro are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Almagro know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Stéfano Perdomo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
There were 86 minutes on the clock and Quilmes had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Almagro did not stop to explain themselves.
Player ratings7 Aug 2028
A brace, and Claudio Salto takes the afternoon — 8.73
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Claudio Salto provided it, and the 8.73 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almagro 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 Gino Barbieri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
50 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.