There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.92 at 37, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad12 Mar 2029
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
11 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
Marked 8.19 — 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.
Four paragraphs on the club website, none of them about football. The board thanked him, wished him well, and had the search under way before the page went up.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Zulia kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Portuguesa will be asked about the last half hour all week.
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.
“Somebody has to pick the team on Saturday, and this week that is me.” An interim appointment with no promises attached, which is how most of them start.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Portuguesa is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Moisés Acuña 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 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.
12 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.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Portuguesa is running low.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Marked 8.31. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Portuguesa.
Squad12 Feb 2029
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Favio Funes 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.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Jonathan Cañete 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. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Alejandro Herrera and Portuguesa agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Portuguesa is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom22 Jan 2029
7 academy players handed senior numbers at Portuguesa
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Gabriel Rosales 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. Juan Castillo 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.
Jonathan Cañete 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
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
“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 Portuguesa, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad18 Dec 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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 paperwork is done long before the player is. Vladislav Djuraev has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Portuguesa have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Position 14 and 28 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Juan Reyes will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Portuguesa the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Moisés Acuña 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 70 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad24 Jul 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 100 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Jonathan Cañete 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 shirt still fits. Miguel Arango is back at Portuguesa, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Deportivo Lara left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad26 Jun 2028
José Useche 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa 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 Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
22 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.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Moisés Acuña 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Portuguesa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad29 May 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Deportivo Tachira? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
11 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Portuguesa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Archil Gamsakhurdia is a Portuguesa player again, and the town has its story of the summer.
Squad22 May 2028
Moisés Acuña 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.
Position 14 and 14 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
27 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.
25 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Llaneros left with the points after a 2‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
Marked 8.45 — 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Farouk Musisi has just signed for Portuguesa, and for once the answer mattered.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Portuguesa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
20 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.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Lautaro Lovazzano is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Brayan Morales has just signed for Portuguesa, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Moisés Acuña 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.
Shots: 8. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 18 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Edwin Peraza 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 has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Lautaro Lovazzano signs something — a contract at Portuguesa or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa 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 Portuguesa, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Lebogang Mswane is living that version at Portuguesa, and it tends to show in the first month.
Marked 8.68 — 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.
Marked 8.34 — 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Portuguesa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
4 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 Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Marked 8.85 — 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. David Osorio 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Daniel Cordova is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. David Ferraresi 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Andres Savarino 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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moisés Acuña 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
Johan Moreno 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 Lautaro Lovazzano, and the manager let it.
Squad17 Jan 2028
Moisés Acuña 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.
He is 20, and nobody at Portuguesa signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom10 Jan 2028
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Portuguesa
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
“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 Portuguesa, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jonathan Cañete 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 Portuguesa 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 65 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Andres Herrera has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Jan 2028
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Óscar 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Portuguesa know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
MarketThe window shut and Carlos Suárez is still in the building
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 72 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadÓscar González falls out with a teammate over standards
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Jonathan Cañete 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: Llaneros will make the call about Óscar González this week. Portuguesa have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
In brief
SquadJohan Moreno has become a man the manager trusts
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 88 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Portuguesa is running low.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 95 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Óscar 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.
Every squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Johan Moreno is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Portuguesa know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Portuguesa 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 Portuguesa 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 Portuguesa can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Portuguesa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Marco Bustillo is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
In brief
Boardroom$575.4K taken back off the Portuguesa table
“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 Portuguesa, and it is not being withdrawn.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marco Bustillo provided it, and the 8.09 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Portuguesa and Llaneros in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
Nobody at Portuguesa 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Portuguesa can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
The deal that would have taken Óscar González to Estudiantes de Caracas has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Portuguesa with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.21 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad2 Aug 2027
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Óscar 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
26 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.
Jonathan Cañete 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 Jul 2027
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Óscar 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.
“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 Portuguesa, 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 Portuguesa 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Andres Herrera has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
33 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marco Bustillo provided it, and the 8.43 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
He is going to Zamora, the club has $550.0K it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Jonathan Cañete 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.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Words at Portuguesa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Óscar 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.
Nobody at Portuguesa 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 offer from Estudiantes de Caracas for Óscar González 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 have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Portuguesa can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The name of José Pérez has come up in conversations Portuguesa were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Successful dribbles: 18. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad14 Jun 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Moisés Acuña's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 16 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Boardroom31 May 2027
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Portuguesa
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Portuguesa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 23 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Jonathan Cañete 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. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
17 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 30 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 24 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Portuguesa 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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 46 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Portuguesa is running low.
“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 Portuguesa, 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 Portuguesa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 53 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Jonathan Cañete 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.