The offer from Real Sociedad for Ryunosuke Sato 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.
Bart Verbruggen and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Words at Valencia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hugo Duro 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 ambition story running the other way, and the one nobody tells: a footballer asking for a smaller stage, fewer cameras and a crowd that does not turn. It is not weakness and it is very rarely reported as anything else.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Fernando Diez after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Two goals and a mark of 9.23 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valencia is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“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 The request is on a desk at Valencia, and it is not being withdrawn.
Arnau Martínez 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.
Squad23 Oct 2028
Words at Valencia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Samu Aghehowa 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.
8 goals in one match, Samu Aghehowa on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Valencia and Elche.
Luis Rioja 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Samu Aghehowa was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Valencia have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valencia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Sergio Rodelas is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valencia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Hugo Duro trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Filip Ugrinić 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.
“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 Valencia, 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 Valencia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Samu Aghehowa 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bournemouth have kept their man, and Valencia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Valencia are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The dugout24 Jan 2028
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Pol Ramírez to a room that had heard them before.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 12 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
1‑4 to Barcelona, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Player ratings27 Dec 2027
Iván Ríos could not have asked for more on his first appearance — 7.95
Debuts are survived rather than enjoyed. This one was enjoyed: 7.95, 1 goals, and a manager already being asked whether he starts again next week.
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.
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.
He is 15 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hugo Duro was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 8.16 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The words a physio says slowly. 44 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.
0‑4 to Real Madrid, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Edgar Segovia will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valencia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Samu Aghehowa was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Arnaut Danjuma 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.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Filip Ugrinić wants continental football; whether Valencia can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Words at Valencia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hugo Duro 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 fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Leo Cortés has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Raúl 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.
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.
11 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.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 104 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
The name of Julen Agirrezabala has come up in conversations Racing Santander were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Valencia have gone to Racing Santander with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Valencia have gone to Granada with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Andorra have accepted the money. What Valencia do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Granada have kept their man, and Valencia go back to a list with one name crossed off 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 Valencia can pretend not to have heard.
“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 Valencia 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 Valencia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Words at Valencia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Samu Aghehowa 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.
Huesca will want this one forgotten quickly: 5‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Racing Santander were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
8 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Player ratings17 May 2027
A brace, and Yassir Zabiri takes the afternoon — 9.77
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Yassir Zabiri provided it, and the 9.77 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.33 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Racing Santander and Huesca, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jeanuël Belocian 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.
Samu Aghehowa 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 Valencia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Valencia 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.
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Umar Sadiq has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
7 goals in 39 games at Racing Santander — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Valencia updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Arnaut Danjuma has written the date down.
7 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 87th, and Almería spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Simon Eriksson and Racing Santander agree another 5 years.
He is 20 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.95, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings3 May 2027
A brace, and Andrés Martín takes the afternoon — 9.89
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Andrés Martín provided it, and the 9.89 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
6 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Iván Martín 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.
Squad3 May 2027
Getting past Julen Agirrezabala has become the hardest job in the division
15 clean sheets and counting. Forwards used to back themselves here; now they shoot early, shoot wide, and look for somebody to blame.
6 goals in one match, Yassir Zabiri on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Racing Santander and Cádiz.
Gijón will want this one forgotten quickly: 6‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Racing Santander were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Two goals and a mark of 8.50 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Iván Martín 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Racing Santander and Gijón in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Racing Santander this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Yassir Zabiri 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.