Marked for Leonardo Consiglio
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad22 May 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Modena may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad22 May 2028
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad22 May 2028
Stefano Turati 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.
Squad22 May 2028
Simon Sohm 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.
Loan watch22 May 2028
35 starts and an average of 6.82. He went there to play and he is playing, which is the only thing a loan was ever for.
Market22 May 2028
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Grégoire Defrel signs something — a contract at Modena or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market1 May 2028
“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.
Player ratings1 May 2028
Successful dribbles: 25. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market1 May 2028
Only the photograph left for Thomazella
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Thomazella will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Modena the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market1 May 2028
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Modena heard it as anything else.
Squad1 May 2028
Tempers go at Modena
Simon Sohm 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.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at Modena training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Stefano Turati 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.
Squad1 May 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; Modena are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Match29 Apr 2028
0‑1 to Sampdoria, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad1 May 2028
Andrei Miron gets it from the manager
“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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad24 Apr 2028
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 13 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings24 Apr 2028
Two goals and a mark of 8.48 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match22 Apr 2028
Nobody wants to play Modena right now
3 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.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Stefano Turati 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.
Match22 Apr 2028
It finished 2‑1, and it was Pedro Mendes’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Modena.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Paulo Azzi gets it from the manager
“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.
Player ratings24 Apr 2028
Nobody could get near Harry Gray
Successful dribbles: 17. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Loan watch24 Apr 2028
33 starts and an average of 6.82. He went there to play and he is playing, which is the only thing a loan was ever for.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad27 Mar 2028
A fracture rules Nana Welbeck out for 67 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Livorno will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom27 Mar 2028
Pressure builds in the Livorno boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Squad27 Mar 2028
“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.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Moses Odjer in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Livorno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings27 Mar 2028
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The terraces27 Mar 2028
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Leonardo Consiglio 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
Steady
Market27 Mar 2028
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Andrea Ciofi 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 ratings27 Mar 2028
Successful dribbles: 20. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match25 Mar 2028
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Pedro Mendes. 1‑0 against Cremonese, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings27 Mar 2028
Defensive actions: 18, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Squad27 Mar 2028
“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.
Squad27 Mar 2028
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.
Player ratings27 Mar 2028
14 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad6 Mar 2028
A fracture rules Nana Welbeck out for 90 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Livorno will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Squad6 Mar 2028
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Squad6 Mar 2028
“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.
Squad6 Mar 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Moses Odjer commits to Livorno for another 3 years.
Match4 Mar 2028
Three points for Livorno, 2‑0 the final word against Torres in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Player ratings6 Mar 2028
A defender's afternoon for Moses Odjer
Defensive actions: 19. He was first to everything and second to nothing, and the goalkeeper had an easy day because of it.
Player ratings6 Mar 2028
Successful dribbles: 12. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
Livorno pull $252.6K back off the table
The money that was there in the summer is not there now. Nobody upstairs calls this a change of ambition, and everybody downstairs reads it as one.
In brief
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Player ratings
Nothing got past Leon Baldi
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Boardroom
Livorno answer back
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Boardroom
The Livorno production line keeps running
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad28 Feb 2028
Nana Welbeck breaks a bone — 98 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 98 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Boardroom28 Feb 2028
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Livorno
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
Squad28 Feb 2028
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.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Nana Welbeck in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Livorno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Words at Livorno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mario Noce 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 terraces28 Feb 2028
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Leonardo Consiglio 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.
Player ratings28 Feb 2028
Defensive actions: 18, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Match26 Feb 2028
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Vis Pesaro defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Market28 Feb 2028
The Kevin Biondi talk will not go away
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Livorno know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match26 Feb 2028
No end in sight to Modena's wait for a win
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Modena has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Stefano Turati 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.
Squad28 Feb 2028
“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 Modena know it.
Player ratings28 Feb 2028
Marked 7.94 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Modena had the best player on the pitch.
Squad28 Feb 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Alessandro Donadoni and Modena agree another 3 years.
Match26 Feb 2028
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
Player ratings28 Feb 2028
Nobody could get near Harry Gray
Successful dribbles: 14. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market28 Feb 2028
Modena have made Artur Ioniţă available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad17 Jan 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 111 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Player ratings17 Jan 2028
26 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Match15 Jan 2028
4 matches without a win for Livorno
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Livorno are no longer polite ones.
Squad17 Jan 2028
Nana Welbeck 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 terraces17 Jan 2028
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Leonardo Consiglio 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.
Squad17 Jan 2028
Riccardo Capparella 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad10 Jan 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 118 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Jacopo Marinari: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Livorno have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Words at Livorno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nana Welbeck 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.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Kevin Haveri in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Livorno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match8 Jan 2028
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Player ratings10 Jan 2028
Successful dribbles: 12. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad30 Aug 2027
A fracture rules Christian Molara out for 39 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Modena will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market30 Aug 2027
Éder 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 Modena can pretend not to have heard.
Match28 Aug 2027
6 matches without a win for Modena
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around Modena are no longer polite ones.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Tempers go at Modena
Fabio Gerli 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.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Leonardo Consiglio is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Alessandro Sersanti has improved at 25, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Match28 Aug 2027
Modena 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.
Market30 Aug 2027
Thomazella told to find a new club
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Thomazella has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Modena.
Market30 Aug 2027
Both sides expect a conversation in the coming days. Modena will name a price, and everything after that is arithmetic.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad14 Jun 2027
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 Modena have had the benefit of it.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Éder 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.
Squad14 Jun 2027
No hiding place for Éder
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Éder, and the manager let it.
Market14 Jun 2027
Everyone has stopped pretending: Novara will make the call about Antonio Imputato this week. Modena have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Market14 Jun 2027
A season-long audition: Leeds United still own him, but the shirt and the minutes are Modena's to give. A loan is a bet both clubs believe they are winning.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market7 Jun 2027
“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 Modena, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market7 Jun 2027
Modena say no — this time
The offer from Giugliano for Gady Beyuku 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Tempers go at Modena
Fabio Gerli 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.
Market7 Jun 2027
Add another name to the list: Cavese have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Antonio Imputato. The answer from Modena has not changed — yet.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Words at Modena training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Francesco Zampano 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Francesco Zampano, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad29 Mar 2027
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.
Player ratings29 Mar 2027
A defender's goal wins it for Modena — 7.44
1 for Alessandro Sersanti, marked 7.44, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Tempers go at Modena
Charalampos Lykogiannis 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.
Market29 Mar 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Modena is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match27 Mar 2027
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad29 Mar 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alessandro Bianco, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match27 Feb 2027
A 2-goal lead gone for Modena
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Mantova kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Modena will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Squad1 Mar 2027
There were 7 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Market1 Mar 2027
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Fabrizio Bagheria will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Modena the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Modena training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Charalampos Lykogiannis 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.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Éder wants to go home
“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 Modena know it.
Loan watch1 Mar 2027
“I watch every Modena game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Vis Pesaro runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
A performance of 8.07 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match2 Jan 2027
No end in sight to Modena's wait for a win
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Modena has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad4 Jan 2027
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 Modena have had the benefit of it.
Market4 Jan 2027
Carpi come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Modena did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Fabio Gerli in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Modena this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad4 Jan 2027
“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.
Market4 Jan 2027
The name of Leonardo Consiglio has come up in conversations Modena were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Match2 Jan 2027
A bad afternoon for Modena against Venezia
0‑1 to Venezia, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Paulo Azzi 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.
Boardroom4 Jan 2027
Nobody left the Modena dressing room in a hurry
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.