The offer from Trento for Henrikh Mkhitaryan 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 name of Luís Henrique has come up in conversations Inter were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Reece James 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.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Sebastiano Sartori is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Juventus next, which means a week that starts on Monday. Everything else on this page will be forgotten by Saturday; this fixture will not be forgotten for a year.
Boardroom21 Aug 2028
The ground is getting bigger
The plans are signed off at a capacity of 115640. Decisions like this are judged twenty years later, by people who were not in the room when they were taken.
The chase for Enzo Avaro ended with $5.9M changing hands and Virtus Entella out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Udinese is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $1.4M — a club that wants Rodrigo Bogarín enough to be asked twice.
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Words at Udinese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jakub Piotrowski 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.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Inter have paid $135.9M for Joško Gvardiol, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
Inter asked and Empoli said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Joško Gvardiol is living that version at Inter, and it tends to show in the first month.
The name of Luís Henrique has come up in conversations Inter were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Joško Gvardiol was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $135.9M. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Perugia waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Udinese is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Udinese can pretend not to have heard.
The chase for Alessandro Di Pardo ended with $5.0M changing hands and Sampdoria out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Udinese asked and Padova said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Nicolò Zaniolo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Words at Udinese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Konan N'Dri 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 system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Maduka Okoye had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Crotone waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Udinese is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The offer from Virtus Entella for Lazar Jovanović 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.
Udinese offered $1.5M; Spezia said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Udinese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Udinese can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
This is the season the town will measure the next twenty against. The trophy travels home with the squad, and the route through the streets was agreed days ago.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Inter will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Francesco Pio Esposito obliged against AS Roma. 4‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Inter.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 87 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Francesco Pio Esposito provided it, and the 9.11 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Inter have had the benefit of it.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.97 for the rest of it.
Two goals and a mark of 8.21 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
He is 22 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 ratings20 Dec 2027
Davide Frattesi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.36. 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.63 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
6 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Inter this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. David Neres wants continental football; whether Inter can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
151 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Como lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Mantova had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
“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 Como, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Paris FC for Maxence Caqueret 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 number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $7.9M — a club that wants Emiliano Pattarello enough to be asked twice.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Como this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
158 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Como lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Inter waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Como is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Como have gone to Arezzo with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Como hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
The clubs have shaken hands with Como; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
“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 Inter, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
The offer from Arezzo for Aleksandar Stanković 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 easiest signature of my career.” Thomas Leggio and Como agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad31 May 2027
7 new faces, and Como 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ángel Román Bautista 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Jacobo Ramón trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Nobody at Como 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.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Nazareno Bazán Vera has written the date down.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Nicolas Kühn’s exile
Position 9 on 56 points. Every season is a story and this is the last line of it, and now the club has three months to decide what the next one is about.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Assane Diao did not need any: 7.79, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pontus Almqvist 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Elia Rossi after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Martin Baturina provided it, and the 8.33 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 Como know 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.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Elia Rossi could afford to be generous.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Como this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Adem Sipić has just signed for Como, and for once the answer mattered.
Everybody at Como saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 36 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
24 goals in 28 games at Leganés — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Como updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Assane Diao did not need any: 8.02, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
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.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Assane Diao reports back to Como with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Trevoh Chalobah 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 want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Como hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pontus Almqvist was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Como have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Como can pretend not to have heard.
Como asked and Akhmat Grozny said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Leandro Ilari 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.
“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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
7 new faces, and Como 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.
Parma have accepted the money. What Como do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
The offer from Avellino for Assane Diao 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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Dolomiti Bellunesi waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Como is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The name of Lucas Da Cunha has come up in conversations Como were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Bucharest have kept their man, and Como go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The bid was some way short and Como did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Player ratings4 Jan 2027
Assane Diao, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.86
A mark of 7.86 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.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Joaquín Zappacosta has, at Como, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
20 goals in 19 games at Leganés — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Como updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 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.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Como can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Como have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
19 goals in 17 games at Leganés — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Como updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
“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.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Moise Kean'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.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Como hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Marc Oliver Kempf is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
“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.
7 goals in 12 games at Reggiana — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Como updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
14 goals in 13 games at Leganés — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Como updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
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 1‑2 Elia Rossi left the room before anybody could ask which.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Como know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Juventus next, and one man in the Como dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
What was a back-page story is now a matter for the terraces, and the terraces do not do nuance. Como would like it dealt with before it becomes the only question anybody asks.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 87th, and Salernitana spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Martin Baturina provided it, and the 8.33 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Adrian Lahdo, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 8.29
A mark of 8.29 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Como this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Como have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Assane Diao, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.65
A mark of 7.65 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.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Marked 8.12 — 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.
The young player of the month award goes to a 21-year-old at Como who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
Minute 91, against Venezia, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Luis Milla has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Como this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 39 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Como is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Cagliari will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Como were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
A brace, and Moise Kean takes the afternoon — 9.12
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Moise Kean provided it, and the 9.12 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Assane Diao did not need any: 7.64, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 21 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.
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.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Yan Couto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.58. 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.
The young player of the month award goes to a 20-year-old at Como who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Como can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Every touch weighed, every quote parsed, every mistake replayed. Some players grow into that; some are quietly finished by it; nobody knows which until afterwards.
“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.
“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.