The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Flamurtari have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flamurtari they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The offer went to AF Elbasani this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
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.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say William Baeten is on it.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Flamurtari than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Hetem Lushaj trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 The request is on a desk at Flamurtari, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Igli Xhajollari will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Flamurtari the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Eric Veiga and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Flamurtari will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Flamurtari has been clear about where João Urbáez stands, which is more than many ever get.
Nobody at Flamurtari 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.
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. Flamurtari will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Flamurtari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The one award on the pitch nobody else can win. 12 games in a season in which nobody scored past him, and a career that will be measured against this one.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 36 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Flamurtari is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Nobody at Flamurtari 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Todor Todoroski signs something — a contract at Flamurtari or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutOni Patushi knocks on the manager’s door
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Bjori Doku will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Flamurtari the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Todor Todoroski and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Igor Aleksovski trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flamurtari they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say William Baeten is on it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fjoraldo Bejdollari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Flamurtari would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Flamurtari know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Flamurtari is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Flamurtari have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 18 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flamurtari they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Jacques Mbé 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 manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Todor Todoroski is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Flamurtari, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Flamurtari will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Bjori Doku will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Flamurtari the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Stivian Janku and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 53 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Jacques Mbé and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
25 points from position 5. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Hetem Lushaj has written the date down.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Flamurtari, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The words a physio says slowly. 59 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Flamurtari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Hamza Ramani 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 manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jacques Mbé is on it.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ermal Pjeshka after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Partizani Tirana in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
The words a physio says slowly. 122 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The 86th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Christ Evo Ememe decided nobody was going anywhere. Dinamo City had no time left to answer.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Oni Patushi did not need any: 8.27, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
136 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Flamurtari lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Two goals and a mark of 8.34 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.86 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ariol Kaloshi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Flamurtari the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere 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 Flamurtari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
Player ratingsLéo Melo was on a different afternoon to everybody else
“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 Flamurtari, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom6 Sep 2027
Deadline passes with 3 signed and 4 gone
That is the business done at Flamurtari until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
The offer from Vllaznia Shkodër for Ariol Kaloshi was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
$70.0K on the table at Egnatia Rrogozhinë. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Add another name to the list: AF Elbasani have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Hamza Ramani. The answer from Flamurtari has not changed — yet.
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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and AF Elbasani waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Flamurtari is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
$36.0K was the most the club would pay and Teuta Durrës were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Todor Todoroski and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Words at Flamurtari training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dimitris Chantakias 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Flamurtari has been clear about where Igli Xhajollari stands, which is more than many ever get.
Nobody at Flamurtari will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Flamurtari will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Position 5 on 29 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Flamurtari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Flamurtari have gone to Teuta Durrës with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Flamurtari offered $36.0K; Teuta Durrës said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
The name of Ariol Kaloshi has come up in conversations Flamurtari were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dimitris Chantakias was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Pereowei Magbisa is on it.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flamurtari they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Flamurtari can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Jacques Mbé and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dimitris Chantakias was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Flamurtari 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.
In brief
BoardroomOpen for business: Flamurtari enter the window
33 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Flamurtari lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Flamurtari is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Todor Todoroski was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Nobody at Flamurtari 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Lorenc Trashi signs something — a contract at Flamurtari or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Somebody to talk to at the next peg, a few words of the language, and a training ground that has stopped being a foreign country. It never appears in a scouting report and it decides most signings.
The words a physio says slowly. 61 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flamurtari they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Jacques Mbé was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Hetem Lushaj, and the manager let it.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Words at Flamurtari training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dimitris Chantakias is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alex Peralta is on it.
89 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Flamurtari lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flamurtari they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Jacques Mbé 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 have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Flamurtari know it.
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 manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alex Peralta is on it.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Flamurtari. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
In brief
The dugoutErigels Toli knocks on the manager’s door
Loan watchStivian Janku watches his loan from the bench
96 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Flamurtari lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Flamurtari, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jacques Mbé and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Flamurtari know it.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
0 appearances, 0 clean sheets, and a goalkeeper no further forward than the day he left. Whether that belongs to him, to the club that borrowed him or to the people who arranged it is the argument Flamurtari will have this month.
The words a physio says slowly. 117 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Flamurtari is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Cristian Núñez was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Nobody at Flamurtari 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.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Flamurtari would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
Flamurtari spent a month trying to move him and nobody rang back. He trains with a squad that has told him where he stands, and both sides start counting down to the next one.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Flamurtari can pretend not to have heard.
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. Flamurtari will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.94 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The phone has started ringing about Eslit Sala again, and this time the name on the line is Luftëtari. Flamurtari are listening politely and promising nothing.
Jacques Mbé 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.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Flamurtari will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ermal Pjeshka after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Jacques Mbé trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Oni Patushi is on it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Egnatia Rrogozhinë in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
19 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Cristian Núñez and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Momčilo Rašo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alex Peralta is on it.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Léo Melo’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Flamurtari needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Flamurtari will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Flamurtari, and both men came out saying it was fine.
In brief
Looking aheadLooking ahead: the trip to AF Elbasani
The dugoutThe manager plants his flag on Lorenc Trashi
13 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Jacques Mbé and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Pereowei Magbisa 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Pereowei Magbisa. 1‑0 against Vora, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Momčilo Rašo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Ermal Pjeshka could afford to be generous.
In brief
Player ratingsA defender's afternoon for Jacques Mbé
Cristian Núñez and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Vllaznia Shkodër left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Ermal Pjeshka to a room that had heard them before.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Partizani Tirana in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
What was a back-page link has become a chant, and the chant is not friendly. Flamurtari would rather it were settled quietly, and it has stopped being quiet.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Lorenc Trashi signs something — a contract at Flamurtari or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.