A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Almería will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Almería can pretend not to have heard.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Almería will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Almería can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almería this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Something was said to Miguel De la Fuente and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
4 saves does not settle the argument about whose fault it was, and the argument will run all week. Goalkeepers carry these scorelines whoever caused them.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Almería will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 9 combined actions and a mark of 6.96, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Ismael Duran on a 2‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Almería can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almería this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Andrés Fernández has his answer from Almería; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Andrés Fernández trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Almería will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Eibar kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Almería will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
A brace, and Jon Morcillo takes the afternoon — 8.63
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jon Morcillo provided it, and the 8.63 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 7 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.79 for the rest of it.
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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Almería will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.86 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
1 for Gui, marked 7.73, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Almería and Cultural Leonesa in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Almería asked and Veracruz said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 32 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 17 arrived, 3 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Castellón have kept their man, and Almería go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Toluca is saying, and nobody at Almería is enjoying the guessing.
Álex Muñoz 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 demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Mikel Vesga is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Sergio Arribas is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Almería will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Almería will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Unión de Santa Fe have kept their man, and Almería go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Almería will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The offer from Levante for Sergio Arribas 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.
The phone has started ringing about Rodrigo Ely again, and this time the name on the line is Cádiz. Almería are listening politely and promising nothing.
Almería asked and Elche said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and André Horta was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Almería will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Almería offered $8.2M; Rayo Vallecano said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
The offer from Girona for Marcos Luna 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.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $11.4M — a club that wants Ionuţ Radu enough to be asked twice.
Ezequiel Ávila 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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Almería are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Huesca next, and one man in the Almería dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Almería will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
$8.2M on the table at Rayo Vallecano. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Celta have kept their man, and Almería go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Betis did not want to sell and the number is why they did. $2.1M for Ezequiel Ávila, and the expectation that arrives with him is the kind no amount of settling-in period softens.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $11.4M — a club that wants Isi Palazón enough to be asked twice.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almería this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. José Torres 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Izei Sánchez is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Almería will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Almería hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Mikel Vesga 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. Gimnasia La Plata have kept their man, and Almería 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 Almería can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad3 Aug 2026
André Horta 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.