This is post five of a wider series. A series for FM22.
“This is it.”
In-game date: 11 December 2023
The ordinarily energetic Fernando Teixidó looks anxious, sat behind a collection of microphones clipped to a table in the press room at the Monumental David Arellano.
The Peruvian’s third season in charge of the Chilean side Colo-Colo has come to an end in the last few days and rumours have been rife about the popular manager moving on.
“Veni. Vidi. Vici…”
Teixidó surprises everyone in the room as he opens his address in Latin. The room falls into silence, save for the tapping of smart-phones and rustling of notepads. “Three years. Three league titles. Three domestic cups. Yet I am sorry. I wanted to win Copa Libertadores for you all. 1991 was too long ago and I thank you for your patience with me.” Pausing to take a sip of water, many of the Santiago-based journalists in attendance have a very strong idea of what’s coming next.
“This year, this group of players battled harder than even I knew they were capable of in order to reach the semi-final of the Libertadores. That is an incredible achievement. They did that for themselves. They did that for this club. They did that for you.”
“To propel this club to the next level however, I must now pass the baton to the next conductor. The disappointment of our near glory is too heavy to bear and I owe it to my family and to you, to switch focus and to rest. For this wonderful club to be led a new innovator, full of fresh ideas and renewed optimism.”
A largely undefeated season being derailed thanks to a 14-0 aggregate loss to Flamengo would be a crushing blow for even the most committed tacticians.
One of my theangrylinesmen associates, fellow journalist and former Teixidó antagonist Carl Hagedorn interrupts with a typically direct question, “Where will you go, Fernando? Back to Peru? To La Paz? To Vallecas perhaps?”
There’s a long pause as Fernando looks down at the floor then up at the ceiling above the gathered press before responding.
“Carl, my friend. I will stay in Macul. You will see me in the stands, like any other supporter of this great football club.”
A ripple of applause creeps across the room as the Peruvian looks visibly emotional behind his beaming smile.
“My career has been very kind to me. The Strongest. Rayo Vallecano. Colo-Colo. I have worked with a number of incredible people in three different countries and while I am not retiring, for now I will take some time with my family.”
“Thank you for attending.”
The representatives of the various Colo-Colo supporters groups in the room break into a chant, “Humility! Nobility! Integrity!” It’s a phrase synonymous with Teixidó and seems a fitting send-off.
With that, Fernando Teixidó, the highly thought of manager of Colo-Colo, exits the stage. Both literally and figuratively, as the Peruvian departs the club.
Teixidó signs off with an excellent 73% win ratio, with just 10 defeats from 132 matches in charge. A true success.
There will be a new direction for Colo-Colo but in which form is not yet clear. Rumours are linking Deportes La Serena manager Ivo Basay, but his camp is yet to comment.
As always, we will break any new manager news on theangrylinesmen website, or on our many social media channels.
Mark Garner for theangrylinesmen
The 2023 season
In the immortal words of Michael Jackson (the iconic performer, not the caretaker Burnley manager), “This is it.”
Before we sign off from the third Fernando Teixidó series however, let’s take a closer look at how the 2023 campaign turned out, beyond what we know already.
Two invincible league campaigns in three years with only two defeats in the successful season in the middle is frankly absurd. When Teixidó joined the club, the first order of business was to dethrone bitter rivals Universidad Católica. The three league wins plus two Super Copa victories and single Copa Chile would suggest that this first objective was truly completed.
The ultimate disappointment of this year’s Copa Libertadores campaign was crushing. Seeing off former club The Strongest, Santos, Boca Juniors and last year’s nemesis Sporting Cristal was no mean feat, but the manner of the complete collapse against Brazilian giants Flamengo in the semi-final showed a team who were dead on their feet, high on their success yet battered, bruised and slumped against the ropes. The gulf between the sides is incredible. Colo-Colo are valued as a club at $21million. Flamengo on the other hand are considered to be worth some $291million. That Colo-Colo were even in the fight to begin with is an incredible over-achievement.
At the end of the last post we posed a couple of interesting questions. One of which was if Nacho Saavedra was going to make his loan move from Juventus permanent. In short, yes he did. It was a protracted series of negotiations, with no agreement able to be struck while the young defensive midfielder was actually in Chile. Instead, Teixidó had to wait until Saavedra had returned to Turin, before opening the conversation again. A fee of $1.3million was agreed, making him Teixidó’s record signing while in charge of Colo-Colo.
This signing allowed club veteran Leonardo Gil to achieve his lifelong ambition of playing in Europe at the age of 31. A $4million deal for the midfielder was struck with Bordeaux. The revenue from this move is huge for a club of Colo-Colo’s stature.
A signing of note was Nacho Ramírez, who bagged 11 goals in 15 starts since his bargain $150k move from Uruguay’s Liverpool FC. Also Gustavo Blanco, a free signing from Atletico Mineiro who became a mainstay in the number ten role. Lastly, Chilean defender Thomas Galdames, a $750k capture from rivals Club Unión Española. Galdames slotted in so seamlessly into the centre of Colo-Colo’s defence in fact, that it even allowed club icon Emiliano Amor to move to Gremio, freeing up a ‘foreigner’ squad registration slot and netting the Chilean club a fee of $1.1million.
Performance review
If you have been following the blog recently, you may have read my post on some new statistical analysis metrics I’ve been calculating for my teams. That post is here, if you haven’t yet seen it.
It seems only fitting, given that this is my first story post since the release of the above article, and the last post of this Colo-Colo series, to sign off on some performance analysis using these new metrics.
Here are some key insights, evaluating only outfield players who managed 1,000+ minutes on the pitch this season:
- Jeyson Rojas was again an incredible star at right-back. The continued interest in him from European clubs is justified. Second only to centre-back Thomas Galdames in terms of number of defensive contributions per 90, when coupled with his attacking output, he was Colo-Colo’s highest-performing player overall, with an OAC + ODC (overall attacking contribution plus overall defensive contribution) result of 2.572.
- Juan Martin Lucero or El Gato as he is known, had another incredible season in attack. His 42 goals in 50 games brings his overall contribution in his three years at the club to a staggering 109 goals in 127 appearances in all competitions. The undoubted star of the save. That said, interestingly the lesser used veteran Javier Parraguez (30 goals in 25 starts and 13 sub appearances) was more efficient in terms of putting the ball in the net with the number of shots that he had. A common tactical ploy however, was to field Lucero on his merits as both a goal scorer and creator (his Creative Efficiency score [per 90] was second only to new signing Nacho Ramírez from the natural strikers, while playing nearly three and a half times as many minutes), only for Parraguez to come on from the bench when the opposition was tiring to grab a late goal. Parraguez at 33 no longer has the legs to carry him regularly through 90 minutes the way El Gato does (acceleration 9, pace 10, stamina 10), but given his clinical eye for goal; against tiring defenders late in a game he was a perfect weapon as a substitute.
- While Thomas Galdames took the plaudits as the highest performing player for both defensive contributions (ODC) and defensive interferences (DI), 21-year old Daniel González overall contributed around 87.5% as many successful defensive actions as his defensive partner, but at 22.9% of the salary cost. While Galdames takes home $4.5k a week, González only commands $1.3k. The lesson? If the high-performing Galdames is rightly poached by a bigger club because of his performances, González is almost the same player and provides much better value for money. The other key takeaway from this insight point is that if I’m the manager of another side looking for a new central defender, am I buying the effective but pricy Galdames, or can I strike a budget deal for González and get almost the same player? This triggers me into offering González a fresh new contract, as players representing this level of value for money don’t stay off the radar of bigger and wealthier clubs for long, especially managing at a level like Chile’s top tier.
End of season three review
An excellent season with an anticlimactic late disappointment in continental competition. Fernando Teixidó truly hit Colo-Colo’s ceiling in three years and cashing out now before the inevitably required 10+ year grind of slowly moving the dial on the country’s reputation level and financial standing felt appropriate for the flow of the series and at this point in the FM cycle.
Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed the series.
FM Stag