Marked for Eugenio Mena
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match20 Oct 2027
4‑0 against Sport Huancayo, on a night that will be replayed at this club for a generation. Continental reputations are made in single evenings and this was the evening.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Gary Medel breaks a bone — 24 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 24 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Player ratings25 Oct 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.44, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings25 Oct 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.31, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
The dugout25 Oct 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Defences have started doubling up on Matías Palavecino
17 goals and a season average of 7.46 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Market25 Oct 2027
Eugenio Mena hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Universidad Catolica can pretend not to have heard.
Market25 Oct 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Universidad Catolica is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Juan Díaz and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match3 Apr 2027
9 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Universidad Catolica may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sebastián Gómez was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Iván Sandoval 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Time is catching up with Eugenio Mena
Everybody at Universidad Catolica saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 38 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
The award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Universidad Catolica have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.
Loan watch5 Apr 2027
“I did not go to Union Espanola to sit and watch. I want to come back to Universidad Catolica and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 13 matches say the rest.
Match3 Apr 2027
It needed Nicolás Franco to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against O'Higgins, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Francisco Meneses after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match17 Mar 2027
A 4‑3 win over San Luis, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Market22 Mar 2027
“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 Universidad Catolica, and it is not being withdrawn.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Universidad Catolica may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Match17 Mar 2027
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Universidad Catolica scored in the 110th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
Match20 Mar 2027
15 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
A brace, and Matías Palavecino takes the afternoon — 8.48
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Matías Palavecino provided it, and the 8.48 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
Two goals and a mark of 8.24 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
No sign of nerves from Martín Gómez at 20 — 8.33
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Martín Gómez did not need any: 8.33, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
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 7.97 for the rest of it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Two goals and a mark of 8.31 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match27 Feb 2027
13 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.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Eugenio Mena, 38, rolls back the years — 8.27
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.27 at 38, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Sebastián Gómez pops up at the right end — 7.79
7.79, 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.
Match27 Feb 2027
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Universidad Catolica have 3 straight wins of it.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Daniel González 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.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Juan Díaz 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 dugout1 Mar 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Moisés Ramírez, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market30 Nov 2026
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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Branco Ampuero and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match25 Nov 2026
10 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Player ratings30 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
Player ratings30 Nov 2026
A mark of 7.67, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Clemente Montes will call it something else in private.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
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 Fernando Zampedri is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match21 Oct 2026
0‑4. There is a level at which football is played every single week by clubs that have been doing it for fifty years, and an evening like this is what it feels like to arrive there without having done it.
Market26 Oct 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Universidad Catolica can pretend not to have heard.
Match21 Oct 2026
13 matches without defeat, and then Corinthians. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Universidad Catolica training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniel González 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.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Eugenio Mena and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Cristián Cuevas, and the manager let it.
Boardroom26 Oct 2026
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
Jhojan Valencia is still being punished for one mistake
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.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market28 Sep 2026
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Universidad Catolica can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Branco Ampuero 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 dugout28 Sep 2026
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.
Market28 Sep 2026
The Justo Giani story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Justo Giani signs something — a contract at Universidad Catolica or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager makes Iván Sandoval a promise
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Universidad Catolica. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
Diego Valencia knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Universidad Catolica, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market28 Sep 2026
The clock does Diego Valencia’s negotiating for him
3 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Universidad Catolica could ask drops and the wages Diego Valencia can ask rise.
Squad28 Sep 2026
The penny has dropped for Justo Giani
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Universidad Catolica the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Daniel González was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Juan Díaz 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 dugout7 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Nicolás Franco
“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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
11 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Four or five weekends of consistency, measured against everybody else in the division. A quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
Eugenio Mena gets picked when it counts
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 Eugenio Mena is on it.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
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.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match19 Aug 2026
A 1‑0 win over Union La Calera, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
A brace, and Matías Palavecino takes the afternoon — 8.45
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Matías Palavecino provided it, and the 8.45 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Match22 Aug 2026
6 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Eugenio Mena, 38, rolls back the years — 8.07
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.07 at 38, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Branco Ampuero 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.
Match22 Aug 2026
A 2‑0 win over Coquimbo Unido, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Market24 Aug 2026
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Juan Díaz wants continental football; whether Universidad Catolica can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Daniel González was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.