“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 Cracovia know it.
Nicolas Höfler 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 Dominik Piła, and the manager let it.
The dugout1 Mar 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Nicolas Höfler'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.
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout1 Mar 2027
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Filip Frankowski chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” SV Ried may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 2 signed and 3 gone
That is the business done at SV Ried 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 deal with Hellas Verona is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Dijon Kameri 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 Nikki Havenaar was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Cagliari have kept their man, and SV Ried go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. SV Ried will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
“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 Cracovia, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Stripfing for Dijon Kameri 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.
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Cracovia had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
Otar Kakabadze 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 23 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
A 2‑1 win over Gornik Zabrze, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 12 actions, 7.26, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
A brace, and Ajdin Hasić takes the afternoon — 8.41
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ajdin Hasić provided it, and the 8.41 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Sayfallah Ltaief 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 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.
There is a particular helplessness in conceding 2 times before the twentieth minute. Legia tried to reorganise, Cracovia did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Cracovia will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
Position 3, 33 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Szymon Królak 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.
Player of the week, judged against every other man in the division. A small award, and one most careers never collect.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Wiktor Bogacz
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
6 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.
Nicolas Höfler 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.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 10 actions, 6.93, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
“I watch every Cracovia game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Gornik Zabrze runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Filip Frankowski left the room before anybody could ask which.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Mateusz Klich
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Cracovia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Henrich Ravas has his answer from Cracovia; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Cracovia, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Motor Lublin in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Dijon Kameri signs something — a contract at Cracovia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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 Wiktor Żołądź is on it.
4 goals in 9 games at Inhulets — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Cracovia updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Sayfallah Ltaief 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.
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.
A 2‑0 win over Radomiak Radom, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Filip Frankowski kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Dijon Kameri trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Pau Sans has come out of that comparison in the side, and Cracovia have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Something was said to Mateusz Praszelik and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Cracovia, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Two goals and a mark of 8.50 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
A brace, and Dijon Kameri takes the afternoon — 8.31
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Dijon Kameri provided it, and the 8.31 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
He is going to Hammarby, the club has $5.3M 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.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $55.1K — a club that wants Dion Gallapeni enough to be asked twice.
$320.0K on the table at GKS Katowice. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The offer from Kapfenberg for Dijon Kameri 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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.89 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“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 Cracovia know it.
Cracovia asked and FC Copenhagen said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Marked 8.05 — 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.