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 at Molde will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The 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 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 Molde know it.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Molde will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Eirik Haugan will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Molde the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molde this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molde this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Caleb Zady Sery 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Molde is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Grzegorz Krychowiak 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 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 Molde know it.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Albert Posiadała 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Molde they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Birk Risa 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 young player of the month award goes to a 21-year-old at Molde who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Molde, another week without a signature from Kristian Eriksen.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molde this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is going to Eibar, the club has $2.6M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almirante Brown this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Molde paid $580.0K and Almirante Brown took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Leonardo Jara 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 rules permit it and it stings anyway. Kristian Eriksen has agreed terms with Bodo/Glimt for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molde this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Grzegorz Krychowiak 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.
20 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 name of Javier Martínez has come up in conversations Almirante Brown were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Leonardo Jara and Almirante Brown agree another 2 years.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Almirante Brown this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.