It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and José Hernandez was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Carlos Moreno is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Adrián Alcaraz trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Pachuca know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Pachuca 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 19 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 Pachuca 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 Nicolás Vallejo, and the manager let it.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Pachuca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. José Hernandez 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 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Pachuca, and both men came out saying it was fine.
In brief
Looking aheadAn away day at Atlas next for Pachuca
57 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Pachuca lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
54 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
200 games in these colours. Service of that kind gets rarer every season, and the crowd knows it.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Words at Pachuca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. José Hernandez 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 deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 5 arrived, 4 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Morelia keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pachuca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Chiapas made Pachuca work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at Pachuca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. José Hernandez 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 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.
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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 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.
Brian García 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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Adrián Alcaraz, and the manager let it.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Pachuca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alexei Dominguez 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 the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Pachuca will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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.
Sebastián Santos 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 easiest signature of my career.” Carlos Eduardo Camacho and Pachuca agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout14 Sep 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.” Guillermo Jimenez, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pachuca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The shirt still fits. Sebastián Santos is back at Pachuca, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
$96.0K was the most the club would pay and Pumas UNAM were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Brian García 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.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Guillermo Jimenez chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pachuca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Pachuca and Leon have settled on $1.7M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pachuca can pretend not to have heard.
Pachuca offered $1.1M; Club America 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 number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $1.8M — a club that wants Sebastián Santos enough to be asked twice.
José Hernandez 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.
In brief
Squad7 new faces, and Pachuca are still learning each other