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 did not go to Dalian Yingbo to sit and watch. I want to come back to Beijing Guoan and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 13 matches say the rest.
With 4 players away on international duty the sessions are small and the manager can actually hear himself. It is the one break in the season, and it never quite feels like one.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Uroš Spajić trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A call-up flatters the player and the club that produced him in the same breath. Beijing Guoan would like him back in one piece and know they will not be consulted.
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 Bai Yang has written the date down.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Isnik Alimi 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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
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.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Beijing Guoan can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“I watch every Beijing Guoan game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Dalian Yingbo runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
They sit in position 15 and they will be waiting. Away form is where a season shows its true character, and this side has a point to make about its own.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager plants his flag on Fábio Abreu
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
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 did not go to Dalian Yingbo to sit and watch. I want to come back to Beijing Guoan and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Zhang Weijie after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Nicolae Stanciu and Dalian Yingbo agree another 2 years.
“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 Dalian Yingbo know it.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Isnik Alimi 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dalian Yingbo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Minute 85, against Changchun Yatai, 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.
Still no offer on the table, and Isnik Alimi’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Kashiwa Reysol have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.