Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Levente Bősze will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Estoril Praia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Samy Merheg 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.
7.74, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Estoril Praia had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
Squad4 Nov 2030
Words at Estoril Praia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tomás Rocha 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 board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Diogo Conceicao has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Estoril Praia will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Estoril Praia can pretend not to have heard.
The shirt still fits. Josh Key is back at Estoril Praia, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Gustaf Lagerbielke 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.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. AC Milan have kept their man, and Estoril Praia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad8 Jul 2030
Words at Estoril Praia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Moncef Zekri 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.
Juan Musso 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sergio Rodelas 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.
Aleix Garrido scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑2 to Oviedo, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Player ratings27 May 2030
Aleix Garrido was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.01. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Juan Musso 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 has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Eibar will try very hard not to make too much of it.
The first defeat in 4 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Andorra; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Eibar can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The award goes to Arsen Zakharyan, and nobody around here is inclined to argue with the choice.
The dugout8 Apr 2030
Somebody else is better right now than Juan Bernat
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.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Eibar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I watch every Eibar game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Sevilla runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Eibar can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Celías Ingenthron has come out of that comparison in the side, and Eibar have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
28 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Eibar lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 8.59 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Marten-Chris Paalberg did not need any: 7.63, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Eibar heard it as anything else.
Successful dribbles: 23. 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.
Juan Musso 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.
The offer from Ceuta for Juan Múnera 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.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Matheus Figueiredo has, at Eibar, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
40 days with the chair empty, a list of names that grows and shrinks by the day, and not one signature on anything. Every week that passes takes the best candidates off it.
12 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Eibar, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Estoril Praia people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Estoril Praia can pretend not to have heard.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Estoril Praia heard it as anything else.
Samy Merheg 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.
A squad is not eleven players and a wish. Samy Merheg arrives from Nacional to make the number up properly, and the value of that will be argued about in March rather than today.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Josh Knight is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Estoril Praia can pretend not to have heard.
$6.4M on the table at Estrela da Amadora. 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 Lokomotiv Sofia for Moncef Zekri 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Estoril Praia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Estoril Praia heard it as anything else.
Estoril Praia asked and Lusitânia Lourosa said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Estoril Praia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Lusitano Évora have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Tiba. The answer from Estoril Praia has not changed — yet.
“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 Estoril Praia, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Estoril Praia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Medrano 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 Moncef Zekri is on it.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
“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 Estoril Praia, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Luís Gomes will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Estoril Praia 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 Estoril Praia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Estoril Praia, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Estoril Praia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Estoril Praia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad16 Apr 2029
Words at Estoril Praia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Medrano 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.
200 times in these colours, in all weathers and under four or five different managers. That kind of service is quietly disappearing from the game.
Player ratings16 Apr 2029
Jonas Wind was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.22. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
A point taken on 91 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
“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 Estoril Praia, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Estoril Praia, and 2 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Diogo Conceicao after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Sala trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A booking nobody needed, on a night the game was already won. Estoril Praia lose a player for the most avoidable reason there is.
Loan watch19 Mar 2029
Martin Turk’s loan is measured in nothing happening
8 clean sheets from 16 appearances at Aluminij. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Steve N'Goura