Piotr Zieliński 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.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
Market19 Feb 2029
Leganés may not be able to give Marvel what he wants
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marvel wants continental football; whether Leganés can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Leganés told Allen Obando something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Leganés can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Piotr Zieliński 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.
4 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
Squad5 Feb 2029
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
Abel Bretones 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.
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Rubén Peña 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.
3 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Leganés know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Cultural Leonesa? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Nikita Vlasenko has just signed for Leganés, and for once the answer mattered.
Abel Bretones 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.
Squad15 Jan 2029
Rubén Peña 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Leganés can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Diego Alende has just signed for Leganés, and for once the answer mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Leganés will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
“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 Leganés 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 Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Sebastián Moyano, and the manager let it.
Squad1 Jan 2029
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zico Buurmeester 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 board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Abel Bretones 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.
“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 Leganés hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad4 Dec 2028
Rubén Peña 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.
3 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Leganés can pretend not to have heard.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Nov 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Leganés can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Abel Bretones 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 medical room confirms 18 days on the sidelines for Luis Asué, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad6 Nov 2028
Rubén Peña 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
4 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.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
5 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
Squad16 Oct 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Abel Bretones 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.
Squad9 Oct 2028
Rubén Peña 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 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.
14 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
1 for Abel Bretones, marked 7.33, 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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market2 Oct 2028
Leganés may not be able to give Marvel what he wants
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marvel wants continental football; whether Leganés can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Leganés can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Abel Bretones 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Rubén Peña 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Leganés have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Allen Obando has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Luis Asué has improved at 27, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
“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 Leganés, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Leganés can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Abel Bretones 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 27 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Zico Buurmeester wants continental football; whether Leganés can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Rubén Peña 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.
Sebastián Moyano is 37 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
Commercial news is the news nobody sings about and everything else is paid for with. The board will call it a partnership; the accountants will call it the difference between this squad and a smaller one.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
The fee is $2.7M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Málaga drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
6 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.
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
In brief
MarketJavi Hernández returns from a loan that gave him nothing
“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 Leganés, and it is not being withdrawn.
Athletic Bilbao paid $3.4M and Leganés took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
The phone has started ringing about Álvaro Tejero again, and this time the name on the line is Athletic Bilbao. Leganés are listening politely and promising nothing.
Abel Bretones 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.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Rubén Peña 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abel Bretones trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A clause somebody insisted on years ago, in a negotiation nobody remembers, has just paid Leganés $733.3K. Naim García left a long time ago; the paperwork stayed.
The offer from Athletic Bilbao for Enric Franquesa 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.
Deportivo La Coruña paid $3.5M and Leganés took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all 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 Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Zico Buurmeester wants continental football; whether Leganés can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Rubén Peña 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 board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
The offer from Athletic Bilbao for Roberto López 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Jun 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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 was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Leganés has been clear about where Rubén Pulido stands, which is more than many ever get.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad22 May 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Leganés told Óscar Plano something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
5 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.
Abel Bretones 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.
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad15 May 2028
Rubén Peña 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; Leganés are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Leganés can pretend not to have heard.
Abel Bretones 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.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Florian Krebs 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 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 crowd waited for a goal that never came. Gijón defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
7.17, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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: Álex Millán. 1‑0 against Málaga, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
In brief
Player ratingsThe afternoon belonged to Álex Millán
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.95 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
Abel Bretones 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.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Rubén Peña 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 young player of the month award goes to a 21-year-old at Leganés who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
5 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.
5 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.
5 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Leganés can tell you which week it ends in.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
19 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
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.
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.
16 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Leganés lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Leganés can pretend not to have heard.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Abel Bretones wants continental football; whether Leganés can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Abel Bretones 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.
4 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.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Rubén Peña 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 words a physio says slowly. 26 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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.
“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; Leganés are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Leganés can tell you which week it ends in.
“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 Leganés, and 3 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
34 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Leganés lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
480 appearances across 8 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
Abel Bretones 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.
10 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.
The young player of the month award goes to a 21-year-old at Leganés who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
The words a physio says slowly. 42 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Words at Leganés training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Peña 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 words a physio says slowly. 49 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.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 88th, and Real Sociedad B spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
Abel Bretones 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.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Leganés did not have in the autumn.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Rubén Peña 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.
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.
59 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Leganés 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 Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
“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 Leganés know it.
The words a physio says slowly. 69 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.
Abel Bretones 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.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Rubén Peña 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: Nelson Deossa. 1‑0 against Eibar, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Kiyani Zeggen is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
The words a physio says slowly. 76 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.
The offer from Betis for Roberto López 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
The words a physio says slowly. 85 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.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Roberto López scored in the 87th minute, Burgos had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Leganés took the lot.
Abel Bretones 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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Las Palmas will make the call about Enric Franquesa this week. Leganés have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
A 1‑0 win over Burgos, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings24 Jan 2028
Roberto López was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.29. 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.
Successful dribbles: 15. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad24 Jan 2028
6 new faces, and Leganés are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
93 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Leganés lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Florian Krebs has just signed for Leganés, and for once the answer mattered.
The phone has started ringing about Enric Franquesa again, and this time the name on the line is Athletic Bilbao. Leganés are listening politely and promising nothing.
The offer from Granada for Miguel San Román 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 general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Óscar Plano 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
5 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.
5 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Leganés can tell you which week it ends in.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
“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 Leganés, and it is not being withdrawn.
Abel Bretones 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Toya Myogan has just signed for Leganés, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
5 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.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Cádiz defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés 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 Leganés can tell you which week it ends in.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Lalo Aguilar reports back to Leganés with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Leganés heard it as anything else.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Ethan González wins it after the whistle should have gone
90 minutes played. Ethan González found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Albacete went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Rubén Peña 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.
Nobody at Leganés 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.
18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Leganés lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Leganés will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Leganés this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Ignasi Miquel 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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Huesca? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.