Ilaix Moriba 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.
Celta asked and Banfield said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 9 actions, 6.96, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Hugo Álvarez scored in the 85th minute, Getafe had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Celta took the lot.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Celta heard it as anything else.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ilaix Moriba 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.
Marked 8.28 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Celta this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Borja Iglesias
Two goals and a mark of 8.20 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Celta this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A 3‑1 win over Athletic Bilbao, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Marked 8.49 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 10 actions, 7.08, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Something was said to Erick Sánchez and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Pablo Martín, on a 3‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Iago Aspas 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. Ilaix Moriba 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Celta know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Aleix Febas’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Celta needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nobody at Celta 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Celta, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Celta hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Celta this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Celta can tell you which week it ends in.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Aleix Febas is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Iago Aspas 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.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Ilaix Moriba 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.
“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; Celta are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Celta, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Pablo Martín to a room that had heard them before.
He has had enough of the noise. Whether Celta can be a quieter place for him, or whether the only cure is a move somewhere the phone-ins are gentler, is a question for the next few months.
At 21 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.
Ilaix Moriba 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.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Celta can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Aleix Febas 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.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Pablo Martín was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Celta dressing room was either.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Iago Aspas’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Celta needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nobody at Celta is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
At 39 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.02, and nobody on the pitch better.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Ilaix Moriba 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.
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.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Hugo Álvarez in the middle of it, and Osasuna unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
Couhaib Driouech 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 offer went to Lanús 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.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Celta hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Marcos Alonso 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Ilaix Moriba 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.
Celta asked and Olympiacos said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.