Espanyol interviewed the field and appointed the corridor: Interim Coach keeps the job he had been doing in all but title. Sometimes the safest pair of hands is the one already holding the wheel.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
6 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Espanyol can tell you which week it ends in.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Espanyol they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Agustín Cáceres 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.
Squad21 Apr 2036
Antonio Gala 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Espanyol is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad7 May 2035
Words at Espanyol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ricardo Ibañez 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 Espanyol this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ignacio Domínguez and Espanyol agree another 5 years.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Espanyol is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Ángel Jiménez and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad23 Apr 2035
Words at Espanyol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dani Martínez 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 academy exists for exactly this morning. Luken Gómez has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Ignacio Domínguez has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Martín Blanco has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad23 Apr 2035
5 new faces, and Espanyol are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.