Marked for Gabriel Solís
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad14 Feb 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Villarreal B this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Jean Ives Valou 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.
Match12 Feb 2028
Atlético Madrileño left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad14 Feb 2028
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Villarreal B can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout14 Feb 2028
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Squad14 Feb 2028
“I did not sign to watch. Nobody does.” The oldest complaint in the game, and Villarreal B will have to answer it with minutes or with a move.
Market14 Feb 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Diego Conde’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout14 Feb 2028
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
The dugout14 Feb 2028
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Villarreal B. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad10 Jan 2028
27 goals and a season average of 7.57. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Market10 Jan 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 The request is on a desk at Villarreal B, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings10 Jan 2028
No sign of nerves from Hugo López at 21 — 7.75
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Hugo López did not need any: 7.75, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Player ratings10 Jan 2028
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 6.95 for the rest of it.
Player ratings10 Jan 2028
Successful dribbles: 23. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Hugo López 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.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jean Ives Valou was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match8 Jan 2028
A point taken on 87 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
Match8 Jan 2028
It finished 2‑2, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
In brief
-
Squad
Alassane Diatta has had enough of the bench
-
The dugout
The manager makes an example of Jan García
-
The dugout
The manager’s verdict
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market11 Oct 2027
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alassane Diatta will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Villarreal B the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad11 Oct 2027
Words at Villarreal B training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jean Ives Valou 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.
Squad11 Oct 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Villarreal B know it.
Squad11 Oct 2027
“I did not sign to watch. Nobody does.” The oldest complaint in the game, and Villarreal B will have to answer it with minutes or with a move.
Market11 Oct 2027
The name of Pablo Pascual keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Villarreal B say nothing, which says plenty.
Looking ahead11 Oct 2027
Next up on the road: Betis Deportivo, position 10. The supporters who go will talk about it all week and the ones who do not will check their phones at ten to five.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad27 Sep 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Villarreal B know it.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Rubén Gómez 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.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Words at Villarreal B training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jean Ives Valou 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.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
Ninety minutes of Tani Oluwaseyi at his very best
Marked 8.16. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Villarreal B.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
Eneko Ortiz gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Villarreal B told Jean Ives Valou something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Match25 Sep 2027
It needed Tani Oluwaseyi to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Alcorcón, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
Rubén Gómez knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Villarreal B, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
Markel Cruz: “We have to be better”
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.