He arrived for a fee and leaves for a fraction of it. $24.7K of what Unionistas paid for Eduard Duţu is money the club will not see again, and the boardroom will be asked about it for two seasons.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Sevilla have kept their man, and Unionistas go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The name of Guido Segura has come up in conversations Unionistas were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 0 arrived, 6 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Unionistas is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Cristian Torrelavid reports back to Unionistas with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cristo Romero was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Talavera will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Unionistas were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Cristian Torrelavid will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Unionistas the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Youssef Amyn 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cristo Romero was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The words a physio says slowly. 105 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“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 The request is on a desk at Unionistas, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Unionistas have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The deal with Barcelona is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Arenas Club moved on, Cristian Torrelavid reports back to Unionistas, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Unionistas asked and Zaragoza said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad25 Jun 2035
Words at Unionistas training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luciano Martins 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 name of Enzo Alonso has come up in conversations Unionistas were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
133 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Unionistas lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Unionistas this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 May 2035
Cristo Romero 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 paperwork is done long before the player is. Ramiro Fortino has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Unionistas have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Carlos Domínguez is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Lucio Garberi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Unionistas. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The words a physio says slowly. 19 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“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 Unionistas know it.
9 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.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 86. Pontevedra had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Dani Fernández will call it something else in private.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Unionistas they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Unionistas had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Celta, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Unionistas can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Juan Ibarrola and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad26 Feb 2035
Words at Unionistas training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Cristo Romero 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Juan Ibarrola. 2‑0 against Hércules, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Unionistas will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 91th minute. Cacereño will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Two goals and a mark of 8.67 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Cacereño made Unionistas work for it, but the scoreboard read 3‑2 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad13 Nov 2034
Words at Unionistas training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Cristo Romero 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 is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Unionistas told Dani Fernández something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.