Marked for Iván Tello
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match15 Dec 2029
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Exeter City scored in the 93th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
The dugout17 Dec 2029
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Match15 Dec 2029
The run at home goes on for Exeter City
13 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Market17 Dec 2029
Only the photograph left for Keiner Hurtado
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Keiner Hurtado will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Exeter City the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad17 Dec 2029
Ethan Ndiweni and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad17 Dec 2029
Defences have started doubling up on Thierry Gale
12 goals and a season average of 7.35 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad17 Dec 2029
Thierry Gale 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.
Player ratings17 Dec 2029
Nobody could get near Iván Tello
Successful dribbles: 20. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match15 Dec 2029
It finished 2‑1, and it was Brando Preciado’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Exeter City.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings26 Nov 2029
No sign of nerves from Ethan Ndiweni at 21 — 8.28
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ethan Ndiweni did not need any: 8.28, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Match24 Nov 2029
11 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad26 Nov 2029
Ethan Ndiweni 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.
Squad26 Nov 2029
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Thierry Gale was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad26 Nov 2029
11 goals and a season average of 7.31. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
The terraces26 Nov 2029
He is 21 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Player ratings26 Nov 2029
Thierry Gale was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.28. 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.
Squad26 Nov 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Exeter City can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
In brief
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The dugout
The view from the dugout
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The dugout
Keiner Hurtado gets it from the manager
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The dugout
Ed Turns knocks on the manager’s door
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match27 Oct 2029
Nobody wants to play Exeter City right now
5 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Squad29 Oct 2029
Ethan Ndiweni 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 ratings29 Oct 2029
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.
Squad29 Oct 2029
Thierry Gale 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.
Match27 Oct 2029
Exeter City make home a hard place to visit
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.
Match27 Oct 2029
A 2‑1 win over Milton Keynes Dons, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings29 Oct 2029
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.36, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
The dugout29 Oct 2029
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Rodrigo Martins, on a 2‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Looking ahead29 Oct 2029
A test against the best for Exeter City
The team at the top of the table next, and the honest measure of where this side actually is. Anybody can beat the club below them; the question is what happens against Wycombe Wanderers.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad1 Oct 2029
Ethan Ndiweni 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.
Squad1 Oct 2029
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jack Fitzwater was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match29 Sep 2029
5 matches without a win, and then this, against Cambridge United. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Player ratings1 Oct 2029
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.15, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Market1 Oct 2029
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Exeter City, another week without a signature from Mark Gillespie.
Squad1 Oct 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Exeter City can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Squad1 Oct 2029
5 new faces, and Exeter City are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
“That is what I want every week. Not the result, the way they went about it.” The manager, after 1‑0, already talking about the next one.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match19 Sep 2029
1‑1 against Milton Keynes Dons, and the road stops here. Cup exits are quick deaths — no second leg, no next week, just the league from now until May.
Market24 Sep 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad24 Sep 2029
Luca Fernández decides it from twelve yards
1 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Player ratings24 Sep 2029
Iván Tello beats them one at a time
Successful dribbles: 27. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match22 Sep 2029
No end in sight to Exeter City's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Exeter City has to find a result from somewhere.
Market24 Sep 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Exeter City is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad24 Sep 2029
Words at Exeter City training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thierry Gale 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.
Squad24 Sep 2029
Jake Doyle-Hayes 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 terraces24 Sep 2029
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Mariano Riegel 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match12 May 2029
No end in sight to Exeter City's wait for a win
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Exeter City has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad14 May 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Exeter City this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings14 May 2029
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad14 May 2029
Words at Exeter City training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thierry Gale 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.
Match12 May 2029
0‑1 to Lincoln City, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad14 May 2029
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Pedro Dayan and Exeter City agree another 4 years.
Squad14 May 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Exeter City can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout14 May 2029
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 Rodrigo Martins to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout14 May 2029
The team sheet said everything about Matty Warhurst
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Matty Warhurst.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The terraces26 Mar 2029
The mood at Exeter City has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Boardroom26 Mar 2029
Pressure builds in the Exeter City boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Squad26 Mar 2029
Jack Daley breaks a bone — 58 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 58 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market26 Mar 2029
Only the photograph left for Charlie Goode
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Charlie Goode will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Exeter City the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The dugout26 Mar 2029
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad26 Mar 2029
Charlie Goode and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad26 Mar 2029
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jack Fitzwater was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Player ratings26 Mar 2029
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.07, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad19 Mar 2029
Jack Daley breaks a bone — 67 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 67 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Player ratings19 Mar 2029
Two goals and a mark of 8.26 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings19 Mar 2029
Yusuf Ahmed, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.85
A mark of 7.85 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Squad19 Mar 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Exeter City this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Thierry Gale 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.
The terraces19 Mar 2029
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Yusuf Ahmed 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.
Match17 Mar 2029
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Thierry Gale. 2‑0 against Bradford City, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Match17 Mar 2029
The drought breaks for Exeter City
5 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Bradford City were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Squad19 Mar 2029
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Exeter City are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market15 Jan 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Match15 Jan 2029
19 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Market15 Jan 2029
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Adelaide United waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Exeter City is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Squad15 Jan 2029
Charlie Goode 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.
Squad15 Jan 2029
Thierry Gale 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.
The dugout15 Jan 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Match15 Jan 2029
Halfway: Exeter City sit in position 22
19 points at the turn. The first half of a season is a promise; the second is a bill, and the town is about to find out which of the two this one was.
Squad15 Jan 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Esteban Coronel commits to Exeter City for another 4 years.
Squad15 Jan 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Exeter City can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market13 Nov 2028
Jamie Mullins hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Exeter City can pretend not to have heard.
Match11 Nov 2028
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.
Squad13 Nov 2028
Charlie Goode 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.
Squad13 Nov 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Thierry Gale was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match11 Nov 2028
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Player ratings13 Nov 2028
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad13 Nov 2028
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Exeter City are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad13 Nov 2028
The medical room confirms 49 days on the sidelines for Robert Dixon, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
The dugout13 Nov 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Stephen McLaughlin, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match25 Oct 2028
The small margins put Exeter City out
Out, 0‑1 to Nottingham Forest, and the long argument about which of the small moments decided it. The league is all there is now, and everybody knows it.
Squad30 Oct 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Exeter City this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings30 Oct 2028
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Matty Warhurst, and the manager let it.
Squad30 Oct 2028
7 new faces, and Exeter City are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
Edo Kayembe asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
“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.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
Iván Tello dropped after a run of poor form
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.
Match28 Oct 2028
Point won or two lost for Exeter City?
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Stockport County? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market11 Sep 2028
The deal that would have taken Charlie Goode to Bristol City has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Exeter City with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Squad11 Sep 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Exeter City this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Iván Tello gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Iván Tello has just signed for Exeter City, and for once the answer mattered.
Match9 Sep 2028
Mansfield Town left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Sonny Cox 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.
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
A performance of 8.02 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
Thierry Gale beats them one at a time
Successful dribbles: 17. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Market11 Sep 2028
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.