At 39 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.81 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Unai Simón 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.
At 23 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Aitor Paredes was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Athletic Bilbao can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Unai Simón 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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Aitor Paredes 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Gorka Guruzeta. 1‑0 against Barcelona, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Felipe Santana on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Athletic Bilbao know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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 Íñigo Lekue is on it.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Chicharito
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 90th minute. Málaga will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Unai Simón 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.
Successful dribbles: 23. 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Aitor Paredes was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Markel Vidal 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aitor Paredes 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 a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Athletic Bilbao can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.21, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Gorka Guruzeta was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.04. 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.
“I watch every Athletic Bilbao game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Betis runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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 Oihan Sancet is on it.
Unai Simón 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 Aitor Paredes was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ignacio Serrano 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. Jan Marín 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.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Jorge Cardona wants continental football; whether Athletic Bilbao can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
7 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Tigres have kept their man, and Athletic Bilbao go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Mirandés waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Athletic Bilbao is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The offer went to Deportivo La Coruña this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Unai Simón 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 Aitor Paredes was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Athletic Bilbao has been clear about where Yeray stands, which is more than many ever get.
The plan went upstairs and came back down. Nothing about that will make a headline anywhere else, and everybody who works at the training ground will remember it for years.