Los Coladeros, Episode 10: Just Gotta Ride It

11 min readOct 7, 2019

I’ve figured out the problem with my upgraded Coladeros. My chorizo tactics are no longer working. It was quaint when we had a young, tiny squad who didn’t know any better, but now we’re flooded with wonderkids and former international players, telling Lassina Diabaté he’s a slice of sausage stuck to a wall comes off as unprofessional somehow. Unfortunately our bank account is now £710k overdrawn after my frivolous spending, so all I can afford to do is steal the last dry-wipe marker from my bedroom boardroom and scribble our gameplan onto the walls instead.

It’s a gamble, but hopefully the players respond. We’ve got a huge game this afternoon against Figueres, 6th in the league and doing fantastically given their relatively limited squad, and after that crushing defeat to Nástic last time around, it feels like we are here for the taking. I make a couple of changes to try to stem the tide; Diabaté, who has made the most inauspicious of starts in the famous silver and blue, comes out for Jaime, while the Lio Tarachalski experiment will go back on the shelf and the far more experienced Torbjörn Nilsson, who should be running games from midfield with his attributes, returns to the left side of my central three. The phenomenal Orlando Trustfull remains in my central midfield spot alongside Adolfo, while I have the utmost faith in Sestelo and Dunwell to drag us out of the funk we’re wobbling towards.

It’s only after we kick off that I realise I’ve left Sieb Dijkstra in goal, and I’m gripping the arms of my dugout chair so tightly that they almost come off in my hands as star Figueres winger Quique marauds towards our goal in the opening minutes — but his whipped left-wing cross is easily gathered by the flying Dutchman. A bit of early catching practice never did anyone any harm.

Karl Ready then forces Rubén Blaya to smash a shot into the Cartuja Ultras before hoofing Quique fantastically on the left touchline to stop a dangerous counter attack, and it seems like my centre-half troubles might be slowly alleviating themselves. Ready feeds Mustafa, who has a clear run down the flank now that Quique has been booted into the front row, and he takes full advantage. He plunders down the right, speeding past left back Ruano and launching a cross into the box that beats Dunwell, but Sergio Sestelo arrives at the far post! SESTELO!! HNNGGGGGOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLL COLADEROOOOOOS!! Sergio Sestelo heads us into a 10th-minute lead!

Figueres change their shape to try to cause us more problems, but it plays right into our counter-attacking hands. 15 minutes later, after visiting keeper Pablo gathers two crosses from Victory and blocks a shot from Sestelo, a crunching tackle from Jaime results in a booking for my new favourite loanee, and the resulting free kick lands at the feet of Orlando Trustfull. He turns well despite the slippery surface and glides effortlessly through midfield, pushing beyond Algar and dancing around Ruano before unleashing a right-foot drive that batters past Pablo and home for 2–0 to the Rainmakers! And he’s not finished: with the next action of the game, Victory floats over a near post cross, Sestelo heads downwards at goal, Pablo pushes it away, but Trustfull roams into the box and clatters home the loose ball to give us a fabulous 3–0 lead after just over half an hour!

Quique is the only outfield player for Figueres who’s even trying to stem the tide, and before the half time whistle sounds, Dijkstra is forced to make a world-class double save from the Spaniard, who first beats Mustafa and cracks a shot at goal that Sieb can’t hold in the rain, then Quique follows in with a crashing volley that the Dutchman gets up to tip over the bar! What a brilliantly deliberate decision it was to leave him in there. I’d ask for a payrise if we weren’t getting our pre-match meals from the bins around the Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán.

With the whistle in the referee’s mouth for half time, the Stormbringers knock together one of the best team moves the Cartuja Ultras have ever witnessed. It starts with yet another Dijkstra block from a Quique long-range drive, which Jaime gathers and carries out of the area. He hits long towards Sestelo, who exchanges passes with Nilsson and is then tackled by Salas, but recovers the ball in midfield and takes it past the flailing 40-year-old bones of legendary Icelandic forward Arnór Guðjohnsen, now plying his trade in the middle of the Figueres midfield — but still can’t tackle. Sestelo passes along the ground to Dunwell, who scoops it out wide to Victory, advanced down the left. Victory crosses first time to Trustfull, he has no space to shoot so he sets up Dunwell inside the area — Dunwell shimmies past Ruano, steadies himself, and drills a low shot into the far corner for a stunning 4–0 half-time lead! What a recovery from that defeat at Nástic!!

I leave the players as they are for the second half, and they reward me with a fifth goal on the hour mark. After 15 minutes of constant attacks, Adolfo finds Sestelo, who reaches the right byline and crosses to the far post, where Nilsson arrives, and heads towards goal, Pablo parries, but Nilsson follows it in to batter home his first goal for Los Coladeros, and at 5–0, this game is entirely over. The last notable action of the game is a consolation goal for the visitors, scored from the penalty spot after Jaime and Trustfull combine to stamp all over Quique inside the area, but the Figueres star picks himself up and uses the remainder of his unbroken foot bones to smash his penalty past Dijkstra and get the goal he certainly deserves. I give Leandersson and Ipoua some time to impress, which they don’t, but make no mistake — this has been a fantastic team performance to go along with a similarly superb scoreline. We’ve had this result in our back pocket for weeks, we just haven’t made it happen — but this is good. It feels like it could be a turning point.

There’s even more good news after the game as Hospitalet finally pay for having no strikers, going down 2–1 at home to Gavá — with the winning goal scored by Oscar Ollés, a man Gavá have just signed from… Hospitalet themselves. You love to see it.

The Spanish transfer window closes with very little further action, which is also good, since we can’t strengthen any more due to our severe lack of funds — and the week until our next game against Orihuela simply flies by. I decide to leave my winning team as they are, no chorizo required, and send the lads straight back out to see if they can keep doing the business.

We’re 2–0 down after 5 minutes. Literally, they put two crosses into the box, Pablo Couto wins two headers, and they both go in. He’s Orihuela’s top scorer for a reason, I guess, but man. Here we fucking go again.

Naturally, at the other end, Orihuela keeper and captain Ricardo, average rating 6.96 so far this season in the D2B3, is pushing for an international call up with a stunning performance for 20 minutes until our constant pressure finally pays off — Dunwell has a header saved, but Nilsson follows in to celebrate his restoration to the side with his second goal in consecutive games. However, Orihuela manage a third shot on target seven minutes later which, of course, puts them 3–1 up at half time, and even though Sergio Sestelo gets another goal back for us in the second half before taking a solid punch to the face from Alfonso Muñoz in the 89th minute that sees the Orihuela full-back get sent for a not-so-early bath… it’s not enough. We hit 18 efforts on goal in total, they have five, we lose 3–2. The Dijkstra Experiment is officially over and my goalkeeping problem feels insurmountable.

Hospitalet miss two penalties in their game but still win 2–1 thanks to a 90th-minute winner from their DMC, smashing in a worldie from the edge of the box with the last kick of the game to restore their five-point lead at the top of the table. Of course they do. It really feels like it’s going to be their year, doesn’t it? The bastards.

I forlornly return to my office/bedroom at La Cartuja and flick on the radio to help me forget about the fact that I’m halfway through this bottle of Laphroaig, and even though my Spanish still isn’t great, the talk show host I hear is definitely saying that if he was in charge at Real Madrid, original Ronaldo would be the first player he’d sell. Obviously the man is out of his mind, so I check in with the great man’s form this season, and… yeah. Fancy a short holiday to the south, Ronnie? I know some fantastic burger joints.

He doesn’t publicly state that he’s flattered by my interest as I shortlist him, but we both know he is. Just give me time, Mr de Lima. I’ll come for you.

We could do with any sort of shot in the arm as we welcome Barcelona B to La Cartuja, no doubt licking their lips at the prospect of taking shots at our defenceless goal in revenge for the 7–0 pummeling we gave them earlier in the season. I wake up groggy, unshaven and malodorous just in time to watch the Barça players step down from their million-euro team bus, and my heart sinks. We aren’t just facing Rochemback, Iniesta and Geovanni today. Thiago Motta has been downgraded from the first team and has joined up with the other rejects in the time since we last played them — in fact, it has just happened, and this will be his debut for Barcelona B. What wonderful timing.

Bottle in hand, I stumble down to the dressing room in my pyjamas to tell Dijkstra and Ready to go home, restore Pinheiro and Sjöberg to the starting team in their place, then slump into my seat in the dugout, the last nips of whisky sloshing at my side. Louis van Gaal and Co Adriaanse approach to offer pre-match handshakes, but end up helping me to my feet and checking that I’m okay before sloping off to call the police. Narks. Just you wait until my lads do football on your lads. Go get em boys! I need a lie down.

Fortunately for everyone inside La Cartuja, my players are far more sober and upright than I am, and in a double-bill of good news, Thiago Motta doesn’t make the Barcelona B squad — quite a fall from grace for the one-time Brazil international. Van Gaal lines up his side as per the above, a very weird formation that will quite regularly leave them with only one defender, and moves Peque and David García, two DCs, into the left and right wing back positions whenever they have the ball. It’s a maverick move, but no less than I’d expect from the madman in the other technical area.

As you’d expect, considering half their players are regularly in positions they have no idea how to play, your Coladeros bring the thunder to Barcelona for almost the entire first half. I develop a headache behind my right eye at the sight of Geovanni in full flow for the first five or so minutes, but it’s cured almost instantly as Hugo Pinheiro rises to catch his first free kick into the box, then goes down at his feet to smother a dangerous run. I’d almost forgotten he could do that.

Afterwards, it’s all us, and in fact our dominance forces Barcelona into an early change — on 18 minutes, van Gaal swaps a centre-half for a wing-back and moves to a slightly more orthodox 3–5–2, and literally seconds afterwards, Michael Dunwell meets a Sergio Sestelo cross and wallops us into the lead. Great change, Louis.

Five minutes later, he’s at it again: Jamie Victory puts a free-kick into the box, and our esteemed centre-forward grabs his 16th goal of the season to give us a 2–0 half-time lead.

The second half starts and Barcelona’s young superstars are flexing. Andres Iniesta is on the ball far more often than I’d like, and he’s feeding Geovanni with sumptuous passes that he really should score from — but would you believe it, Hugo Pinheiro seems to realise he’s not undroppable, and is performing at the standard I’d expect, keeping the Brazilian at bay as we approach the hour mark. At that moment, Johan Sjöberg intercepts an Iniesta forward pass, and advances out of defence with the ball. That’s fine, Johan — pass it to someone else now please, we’ve only got one at the back. Sjöberg advances through midfield, muscling beyond Fabio Rochemback. JOHAN. PLEASE PASS THE BALL TO SOMEONE ELSE. Sjöberg ignores my inebriated yells and continues on his rampage towards goal, until Fernando races out of defence to tackle him. At that point, he realises he’s about to stuff everything, so switches the ball to Jamie Victory, who takes a touch, steadies himself, then whips the ball into the box, and onto the head of Adolfo, who’s arrived late in the area! ADOLFO!!

HNNNNNNNGGGGGGGOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL COLADEROOOOOOOOOOOOSSSSSSS!!

Adolfo grabs our third of the day, and for the first time, I relax into my chair. In fact I relax too much, and I’m forced to take a quick trip to el baño — and when I return, I’m disappointed to see that our scoresheets have been stained by Oscar López’s first goal for Barcelona B. We were so busy marking the players I’ve heard of, the one I haven’t managed to nip past Smith and tuck home to reduce the score to 3–1. However, as I’m moaning to Jimmy Graham that I can’t leave him in charge for two minutes without other teams scoring and fiddling with my flies, which there are now two of since I can’t really see, Lassina Diabaté — who I’ve thrown on for Orlando Trustfull to give us a bit more steel in the closing stages — crosses low into the box, Sergio Sestelo controls, turns, and curls a delicious left-footed shot into the far corner of Jorquera’s goal to make the game safe with two minutes to go. 4–1 to the Rainmakers, Barcelona are all over the place, and I’ve been a bit sick down myself. That’s. More. Like it.