13 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.
11 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Remo can tell you which week it ends in.
The offer from Ponferradina for Leonel Picco was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Leonel Picco 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 now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Independiente have kept their man, and Remo go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Remo can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Duplexe Tchamba was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
7 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
The phone has started ringing about Leonel Picco again, and this time the name on the line is America de Cali. Remo are listening politely and promising nothing.
Patrick de Paula 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Nottingham Forest have kept their man, and Remo go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
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.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Denzel had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The deal that would have taken Jaderson to Sport Recife has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Remo with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
The deal with Ponte Preta 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.
Remo asked and CSKA Moscow said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
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.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Remo are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Leonel Picco 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Remo asked and Stade Rennais said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Remo have made the call to Estoril Praia. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
In brief
Boardroom89% of the income goes out in wages at Remo
Leonel Picco 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.
A 1‑0 win over Novorizontino, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Duplexe Tchamba 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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Renato Batista could afford to be generous.
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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Remo will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Remo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Leonel Picco 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. Duplexe Tchamba 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.
Nobody at Remo will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
44 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Remo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 52 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Remo can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Henrique Ribeiro is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Wesley Monteiro 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.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
115 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Remo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Remo will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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 is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
133 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Remo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Pedro Rocha 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 had been thinking. Leonel Picco 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.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Remo can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Yago Pikachu damages knee ligaments — 141 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 141 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 know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Ararat had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Duplexe Tchamba 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.
Nobody at Remo will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
116 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Remo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Remo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Léo Lang was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Remo can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Renato Batista after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
Pedro Rocha 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Leonel Picco was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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 Remo know it.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Pedro Rocha was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.14. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Diogo Riquelme has come out of that comparison in the side, and Remo have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
In brief
The dugoutThe view from the dugout
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Calazans
The dugoutPatrick has become a man the manager trusts