It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
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.
At 25 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Haydon Roberts is living that version at Mallorca, and it tends to show in the first month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Fabricio Bedmar is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
In brief
SquadSamú falls out with a teammate over standards
Pablo Torre 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
He has had enough of the noise. Whether Mallorca can be a quieter place for him, or whether the only cure is a move somewhere the phone-ins are gentler, is a question for the next few months.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Mallorca know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody sells a season ticket on a signing like this. Every manager who has been through a bad October wants one anyway, and Mallorca have gone and got theirs early.
In brief
The terracesThe spotlight tightens on Dominik Vott
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Oihan Sosa has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
Pablo Torre 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Sergio Rodelas and Mallorca agree another 5 years.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Manu Morlanes 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 chase for Fabrício ended with $1.2M changing hands and Oviedo out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Sobrino 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.
Squad19 Jun 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Lucas Bergström'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.
Pablo Torre 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 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 Mallorca hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Fabricio Bedmar has just signed for Mallorca, and for once the answer mattered.
A conversation is coming this week. Mallorca will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Manu Morlanes 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Mallorca can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
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.
The phone has started ringing about Samú again, and this time the name on the line is Real Madrid. Mallorca are listening politely and promising nothing.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Samú has his answer from Mallorca; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Squad5 Jun 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Sobrino 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.
Not a month, not a run of form — a whole season of being the best 21-year-old anybody in this division could put on a pitch. This is the honour that gets mentioned for the rest of his career.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Mallorca 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.
Squad22 May 2028
David López 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.
Pablo Torre 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 May 2028
Rubén Sobrino 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.
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.
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.
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.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Arman Durmiši did not need any: 8.09, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Mallorca and Racing Santander, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
Player ratings1 May 2028
Lorenzo Befani, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.63
A mark of 8.63 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Pablo Torre 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 9.07 — 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.
At 19 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.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Arman Durmiši did not need any: 8.33, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Federico Bernardeschi 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Arman Durmiši 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.
Match22 Apr 2028
Another one collected away from home
3 on the bounce on the road for Mallorca. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Marked 8.45. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Mallorca.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Sobrino 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 a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Samú provided it, and the 8.51 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.62, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Rubén Sobrino 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.
11 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.
8 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Virgili did not need any: 9.21, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
He is 21, he is averaging 7.61, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Jan Virgili 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.
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.
Pablo Torre 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Mateu Morey and Mallorca agree another 4 years.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Rubén Sobrino 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 a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.09, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Arman Durmiši is the division's best young player this month
At 19 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Mallorca will try very hard not to make too much of it.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Antonio Raíllo provided it, and the 9.68 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.57 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 29 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 8.90. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Mallorca.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Sobrino 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.
Two goals and a mark of 10.00 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 9.55 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings20 Mar 2028
Jan Virgili, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.45
A mark of 8.45 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
27 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.
“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.
Market20 Mar 2028
Mallorca may not be able to give Samú what he wants
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Samú wants continental football; whether Mallorca can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Mallorca can pretend not to have heard.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Oihan Sosa has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
The 85th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Jan Virgili decided nobody was going anywhere. Almería had no time left to answer.
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.
Player ratings6 Mar 2028
Arman Durmiši, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.91
A mark of 8.91 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.33 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Federico Bernardeschi 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Jan Virgili. 3‑2 against Rayo Vallecano, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Jan Virgili 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.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Johan Mojica 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.
Pablo Torre 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 Feb 2028
Rubén Sobrino 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 Mallorca can pretend not to have heard.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.92 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The deal that would have taken Rubén Sobrino to Las Palmas has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Mallorca with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
A season average of 7.49 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Mallorca know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Pablo Torre 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.
0‑2 to Villarreal, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Johan Mojica 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.
Abdulrahman Al-Otaibi is 20, and Mallorca have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
In brief
Player ratingsThe chances came and went for Abdón Prats
Player ratingsThe one thing Jan Virgili could not do
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Matteo Scanzi is living that version at Mallorca, and it tends to show in the first month.
Marked 8.58 — 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.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Sobrino 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.
An error at the back is a moment; an error in goal is a goal. Lucas Bergström knows it, the crowd knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
Shots: 7. 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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Virgili did not need any: 8.02, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca 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.
Pablo Torre 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 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.
He is 21, he is averaging 7.50, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Federico Bernardeschi 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.
0‑2 to Barcelona, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad17 Jan 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Lucas Bergström'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.
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.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.63 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Sergi Darder 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.
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.
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.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Arman Durmiši did not need any: 7.61, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Market3 Jan 2028
Mallorca may not be able to give Samú what he wants
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Samú wants continental football; whether Mallorca can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Pablo Torre 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 9.23 — 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.
36 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.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Arman Durmiši did not need any: 8.91, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.92 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Arman Durmiši 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.
Samú 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Pablo Torre signs something — a contract at Mallorca or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Jan Virgili, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 10.00
A mark of 10.00 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Valencia the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Mallorca will enjoy reviewing.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Virgili did not need any: 9.14, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The shirt still fits. Julius Biada is back at Mallorca, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Arman Durmiši is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Player ratings6 Dec 2027
Pablo Torre was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.55. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Jan Virgili is the division's best young player this month
At 21 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Mallorca will try very hard not to make too much of it.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Virgili did not need any: 9.39, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.84 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Federico Bernardeschi 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.
A 3‑1 win over Mirandés, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings29 Nov 2027
Manu Morlanes was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.27. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Jan Virgili 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.
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.
A season average of 7.23 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Mallorca know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Sergi Darder 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.
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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.32 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 29 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The shirt still fits. Julius Biada is back at Mallorca, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
A performance of 8.13 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad15 Nov 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rubén Sobrino 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 board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 93th minute. Getafe will replay every second of the added time for a week.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.60, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings8 Nov 2027
Jan Virgili, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 9.15
A mark of 9.15 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.72 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Pablo Torre 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.
Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Julius Biada is a Mallorca player again, and the town has its story of the summer.
27 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Mallorca, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Mallorca told Abdón Prats something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
4‑1, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings25 Oct 2027
A brace, and Jan Virgili takes the afternoon — 9.28
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jan Virgili provided it, and the 9.28 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.21 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Pablo Torre 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.
A season average of 7.12 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Mallorca know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings25 Oct 2027
Pablo Torre was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.32. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.51 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The terraces18 Oct 2027
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 5 of the 25 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
8 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Mallorca has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings4 Oct 2027
Arman Durmiši, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.82
A mark of 7.82 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
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.
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.
Pablo Torre 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.
9 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Mallorca and Villarreal in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Marked 8.86 — 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.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
Pablo Torre was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.50. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Sergio Rodelas is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.96 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
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.
Samú 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Arman Durmiši is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
At 24 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Player ratings6 Sep 2027
Samú was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.14. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Player ratings6 Sep 2027
Pablo Torre was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.04. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Two goals and a mark of 8.98 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 8.61 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Rayo Vallecano paid $4.1M and Mallorca took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Jan Virgili is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Market30 Aug 2027
Mallorca may not be able to give Samú what he wants
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Samú wants continental football; whether Mallorca can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Lucas Bergström 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.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 8 goals between Mallorca and Levante, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings23 Aug 2027
Jan Virgili, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.86
A mark of 8.86 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.14 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Federico Bernardeschi 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Sergio Rodelas is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Oscar Destiny is living that version at Mallorca, and it tends to show in the first month.
Boardroom23 Aug 2027
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Mallorca
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 a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Jan Virgili 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Manuel Ramos 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.
“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 Mallorca, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. David López 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 24 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Pablo Torre 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Mallorca, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Squad2 Aug 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. David López 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.
He is 21, he is averaging 7.36, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Pablo Torre 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 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 15 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca 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. 22 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 Mallorca, 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 Mallorca 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. 29 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 Mallorca can pretend not to have heard.
A season average of 7.36 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Mallorca know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 38 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The phone has started ringing about Antonio Raíllo again, and this time the name on the line is Betis. Mallorca are listening politely and promising nothing.
Pablo Torre 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 45 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The fee is $4.4M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Ceuta drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Pablo Torre 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Zito Luvumbo 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 Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 May 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zito Luvumbo 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.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.34, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Pablo Torre 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 May 2027
Pau Cubarsí 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Pau Cubarsí 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Mallorca training over how hard people work
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Pau Cubarsí did not need any: 9.54, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
28 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.
28 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
3 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Marked 8.57 — 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 11 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.36, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pau Cubarsí 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
Jan Virgili, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 9.08
A mark of 9.08 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
3 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.
Pablo Torre 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.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Pau Cubarsí 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.
A 2‑1 win over Real Sociedad, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
Pablo Torre was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.30. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
46 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.
31 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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Salas did not need any: 9.18, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.01, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Pablo Torre 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 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.
Three points for Mallorca, 1‑0 the final word against Valencia in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Zito Luvumbo 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 were 8 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings12 Apr 2027
Jan Virgili, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 9.13
A mark of 9.13 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pau Cubarsí 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 a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Pau Cubarsí 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.
The terracesThe press cannot get enough of Pau Cubarsí
36Edition
The Mallorca Courier
5 Apr 2027
From our football correspondentCrisis
Player ratings5 Apr 2027
Prince Amoako, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.14
A mark of 8.14 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.26, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Pablo Torre 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Pau Cubarsí 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 a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Prince Amoako 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.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.79 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
A season average of 7.32 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Mallorca know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Pau Cubarsí 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 this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.66, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zito Luvumbo 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 goal that put Elche ahead was still being replayed on the concourse when Mallorca equalised, 4 minutes later. Leads are only worth what you do with them.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 33 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Mallorca has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Pau Cubarsí 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.
Antonio Raíllo 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 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.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Pau Cubarsí did not need any: 8.55, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Pau Cubarsí 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Pablo Torre 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.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zito Luvumbo 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.
0‑3 against Athletic Bilbao, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.27, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Pablo Torre 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.
In brief
BoardroomNobody left the Mallorca dressing room in a hurry
Player ratingsThe one thing Mateo Joseph could not do
There were 8 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Jan Virgili, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.55
A mark of 8.55 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.33, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pau Cubarsí 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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.07 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings22 Feb 2027
Pau Cubarsí, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.95
A mark of 7.95 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.89 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Pablo Torre 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.
Defensive actions: 23, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Pau Cubarsí 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Jan Virgili. 2‑0 against Oviedo, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Oviedo spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.62, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Prince Amoako, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.93
A mark of 8.93 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Mallorca hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Pau Cubarsí 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
An average of 7.14 in a first team he is several years too young for. Mallorca have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Pau Cubarsí 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.
Antonio Raíllo 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 21 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Pau Cubarsí 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Pablo Torre 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: Famalicao will make the call about Johan Mojica this week. Mallorca have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Zito Luvumbo 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 hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Prince Amoako did not need any: 8.85, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Add another name to the list: Villarreal have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Antonio Raíllo. The answer from Mallorca has not changed — yet.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zito Luvumbo 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.
Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad18 Jan 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Sergi Darder'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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Jan Virgili had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Levante were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Virgili did not need any: 8.65, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.82 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Pablo Torre 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.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Add another name to the list: Getafe have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Justin-Noël Kalumba. The answer from Mallorca has not changed — yet.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Jan Virgili 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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.29 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Mallorca will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
He is 19, he is averaging 7.24, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
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.
6 goals in one match, Antonio Raíllo on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Mallorca and Espanyol.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Prince Amoako did not need any: 9.00, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Pablo Torre 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 19 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.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Zito Luvumbo 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Antonio Raíllo will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Mallorca escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Antonio Raíllo provided it, and the 8.07 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Prince Amoako, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.78
A mark of 8.78 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Pablo Torre 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.
Marked 8.62 — 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.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Randy Nteka was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.08. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Prince Amoako, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.61
A mark of 8.61 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Mallorca have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.08, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Jan Virgili 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
There were 88 minutes on the clock and Valencia had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Mallorca did not stop to explain themselves.
Player ratings7 Dec 2026
Prince Amoako, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 9.30
A mark of 9.30 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
A season average of 7.00 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Mallorca know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca 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. 22 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jan Virgili did not need any: 9.25, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Pablo Torre 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Jan Virgili 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
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.
13 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.
In brief
Player ratingsThe one thing Pablo Torre could not do
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 29 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
8 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Mallorca and Atlético Madrid in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
In brief
SquadWords at Mallorca training over how hard people work
10 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 38 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Antonio Raíllo provided it, and the 8.52 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
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.
Pablo Torre 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.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Pablo Torre was on a different afternoon to everybody else
10.00. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
9 goals in one match, Antonio Raíllo on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Mallorca and Elche.
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.
In brief
SquadZito Luvumbo falls out with a teammate over standards
9 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 45 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Levante go through and Mallorca go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 36 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 32 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
7 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Mallorca heard it as anything else.
Johan Mojica 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Zito Luvumbo 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 Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 21 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.54 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Pablo Torre 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 77 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 24 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Pablo Torre 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Prince Amoako is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Pablo Torre 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 figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
At 22 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.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.22, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Mateo Joseph was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.03. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Prince Amoako, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.18
A mark of 8.18 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.37 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
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.
In brief
Player ratingsThe chances came and went for Mateo Joseph
Player ratingsThe one thing Pablo Torre could not do
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
30 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.
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.
Sergi Darder 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 Sep 2026
Zito Luvumbo 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 Mallorca will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
33 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Mallorca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A 1‑0 win over Alavés, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Mallorca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zito Luvumbo 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.
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.
Jan Virgili 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 figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.