At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.96 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Álvaro Rodríguez 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Elche and Huesca in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Álvaro Rodríguez signs something — a contract at Elche or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
Player ratingsThe chances came and went for Abiel Osorio
Player ratingsJordi Escobar changes it off the bench
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.22 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elche this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Federico Redondo 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.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.38 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Álvaro Rodríguez 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Elche is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Mario Sierra has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Elche have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
32 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elche lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Lucas Cepeda 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Elche is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I watch every Elche game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Eibar runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Álvaro Rodríguez 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Elche they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Álvaro Rodríguez signs something — a contract at Elche or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Two goals and a mark of 8.88 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Álvaro Rodríguez 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Elche they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Beaten 2‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad17 Nov 2036
Yago Santiago 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.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Celta spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
Shots: 13. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.78 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Álvaro Rodríguez 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Elche is pretending he will be back in the shirt.