Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Marbella waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Gijón is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The chase for Nahuel Roldán ended with $2.2M changing hands and Deportivo La Coruña out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
“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 Gijón 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 Gijón this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Gijón asked and Girona 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.
Yago Santiago 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.
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.
“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.
6 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.
Gaspar 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.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Yago Santiago 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 goal that put Málaga ahead was still being replayed on the concourse when Gijón equalised, 4 minutes later. Leads are only worth what you do with them.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Daniel Torres after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
A brace, and Antonio Casas takes the afternoon — 8.70
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Antonio Casas provided it, and the 8.70 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Gijón have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Gijón and Leganés in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yago Santiago was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Gijón will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Gijón, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.60 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Gijón have lost him in all but the paperwork.
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.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Andrés Ferrari in the middle of it, and Real Sociedad B unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
César Gelabert 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.
Everybody at Gijón saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 36 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Daniel Torres after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Eric Curbelo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Burgos next, and one man in the Gijón dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
The offer from Vélez for Alejo Sarco 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 win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Gijón hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
César Gelabert 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 20 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Gijón can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
A brace, and Antonio Casas takes the afternoon — 8.41
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Antonio Casas provided it, and the 8.41 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Javier Vargas 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.
Level with 91 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Gijón had all but put away. Málaga will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
14 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.
Successful dribbles: 14. 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Daniel Torres after the 2‑2 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Andrés Ferrari
César Gelabert 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Felipe Pontoni is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Gijón can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 35 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Gijón is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Gaspar in the middle of it, and Ceuta unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 9 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“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 Gijón, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Gijón heard it as anything else.
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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Daniel Torres on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
5 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.