Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 118 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
103 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Celta lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Ferran Jutglà 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 had been thinking. Javi Rodríguez 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.
Alejandro Catena 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Juan Santana is living that version at Osasuna, and it tends to show in the first month.
In brief
SquadJesús Peñaloza falls out with a teammate over standards
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Alejandro Catena 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
9 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
At 28 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Osasuna is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad26 Jun 2034
Words at Osasuna training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alejandro Catena 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Osasuna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Jon Moncayola 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 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Osasuna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Jesús Peñaloza commits to Osasuna for another 4 years.
Squad12 Jun 2034
Words at Osasuna training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alejandro Catena 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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
The mood at Osasuna has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Lucas Torró 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.