Marked for Daniel Sánchez
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match5 Nov 2030
Cup progress for Tenerife
A 3‑1 win over Huesca, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
Player ratings11 Nov 2030
A brace, and Darío Ramírez takes the afternoon — 8.22
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Darío Ramírez provided it, and the 8.22 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market11 Nov 2030
Manuel Remis hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Tenerife can pretend not to have heard.
Match9 Nov 2030
Tenerife make home a hard place to visit
13 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Player ratings11 Nov 2030
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.75 for the rest of it.
Match9 Nov 2030
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 8 matches without defeat is a foundation Tenerife did not have in the autumn.
Squad11 Nov 2030
A falling-out at Tenerife
Santi Comesaña and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings11 Nov 2030
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The dugout11 Nov 2030
This is not rotation. Manuel Remis has not been in the manager's plans for some time, and nobody at Tenerife is pretending otherwise.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market4 Mar 2030
Álvaro Valles hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Tenerife can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings4 Mar 2030
Carles Soria, 33, rolls back the years — 8.14
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.14 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Player ratings4 Mar 2030
A defender's goal wins it for Tenerife — 7.86
1 for Iñaki González, marked 7.86, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Squad4 Mar 2030
Words exchanged at Tenerife
Iván Chapela 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.
Match2 Mar 2030
At last: Tenerife win one
6 matches without a win, and then this, against Lugo. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Match2 Mar 2030
It finished 2‑0, and it was Gorka Carrera’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Tenerife.
Market4 Mar 2030
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Tenerife, another week without a signature from Pinheiro Caio.
Boardroom4 Mar 2030
Tenerife release $5.3M for the manager
The board have put money on the table rather than an encouraging word. What happens to it now is somebody else's problem, and somebody else's job.
Player ratings4 Mar 2030
Nobody could get near Alassan
Successful dribbles: 15. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match29 Dec 2029
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Tenerife scored in the 90th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
Match31 Dec 2029
Tenerife up to position 3
33 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Squad31 Dec 2029
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The dugout31 Dec 2029
Daniel Sánchez: 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.” Tenerife have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market31 Dec 2029
Godoy Cruz come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Tenerife did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad31 Dec 2029
A falling-out at Tenerife
Adryelson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match29 Dec 2029
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Match29 Dec 2029
Whatever happens, Tenerife do not lose
6 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.
The terraces31 Dec 2029
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.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match6 Nov 2029
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Rodrigo Insúa obliged against Ibiza. 2‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Tenerife.
Player ratings12 Nov 2029
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.38, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match10 Nov 2029
Nobody wants to play Tenerife right now
5 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Market12 Nov 2029
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad12 Nov 2029
Words exchanged at Tenerife
Adryelson 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.
Match10 Nov 2029
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Tenerife and Eibar, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Match10 Nov 2029
It finished 4‑2, and it was Baba Diocou’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Tenerife.
Player ratings12 Nov 2029
Iván Chapela did the work nobody counts — 7.39
14 combined actions and 7.39. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
The terraces12 Nov 2029
He is 16 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.