Sebastian Mailat 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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Alexandru Bota did not need any: 7.97, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad29 Oct 2029
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 33 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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.
Sebastian Mailat 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.
In brief
SquadHervin Ongenda falls out with a teammate over standards
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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.
Squad20 Nov 2028
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ştefan Bodişteanu 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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Botosani will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 25 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 86 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The terraces31 Jul 2028
The ground has had enough
“We travel everywhere and we get this.” 8 of the 39 senior players heard it walking off, and the ones who did not hear it were not playing.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.50 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Player ratings31 Jul 2028
A first appearance Roger Leclerc will want to forget — 5.46
Everybody's debut is one of two stories and this was the other one. 5.46, and the only consolation available is that nobody's career has ever been decided by ninety minutes in a shirt he had just been given.
Sebastian Mailat 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 23 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.
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.