74 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Altamura lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
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.
Abba Khalid 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.
Add another name to the list: Ospitaletto have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Edoardo Nicolello. The answer from Altamura has not changed — yet.
The words a physio says slowly. 95 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Roberto Pirrello was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
102 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Altamura lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Altamura they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Giuseppe Simone 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 accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Altamura now.
Squad24 May 2032
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ibrahima Mbaye 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Altamura, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
Match24 Apr 2032
Another one collected away from home
4 on the bounce on the road for Altamura. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ibrahima Mbaye was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 8.00 — 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe view from the dugout
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Kobe Agbude
Two goals and a mark of 9.73 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Altamura they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Alessandro Pentima 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 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.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
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.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Potenza in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Altamura, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ibrahima Mbaye was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ibrahima Mbaye was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Casertana in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Giuseppe Simone 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 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 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 Altamura know it.
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Fiorentina is saying, and nobody at Altamura is enjoying the guessing.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 5 arrived, 6 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Union Brescia have kept their man, and Altamura go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Lumezzane waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Altamura is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Cristian De Angelis was one of the reasons people came, and $9.1M does not replace that by itself.
The deal with Casertana is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
Squad19 Jan 2032
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ibrahima Mbaye 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
The manager may talk to whoever he likes and may pay nobody. A squad survives a window like this by borrowing, by promoting, and by hoping the injuries land somewhere else.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Roberto Pirrello was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
This is money that keeps the lights on rather than money that buys a centre-half, and the difference is the whole story. A club funded by its owner rather than by its football has exactly one conversation left ahead of it.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Alessandro Pentima 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.
The borrowing is past what the bank agreed, which is the line where a debt stops being how football is financed and starts being a problem. Every phone-in in this town will quote the figure for the next five years.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Alessandro Pentima 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Roberto Pirrello was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The embargo bars a fee being paid for a player, whatever the manager thinks the squad needs. Every rumour printed about this club between now and its lifting is a rumour about a deal that cannot happen.
“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.
The dugout22 Dec 2031
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 Interim Coach to a room that had heard them before.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Altamura this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Roberto Pirrello was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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.
The dugout17 Nov 2031
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.” Interim Coach, on a 3‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Nobody at Altamura 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Roberto Pirrello was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Football clubs borrow; that is not the story. Borrowing more than the facility allows is, because from here it is the owner's money or somebody else's decision, and neither of those belongs to the board.
Somebody watched every match in the division at the weekend and decided he was the best thing in any of them. A small honour, and most careers end without one.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Michele Grande’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Altamura needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Altamura, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Altamura have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Foggia waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Altamura is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Aleksandar Dzhamov is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Roberto Pirrello was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Giana Erminio waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Altamura is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Gaetan Doko Bello has just signed for Altamura, and for once the answer mattered.
At 28 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.
Squad21 Jul 2031
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Roberto Pirrello 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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Altamura will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Altamura 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 Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Squad30 Jun 2031
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Abba Khalid 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.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alessandro Pentima is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alessandro Pentima trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Altamura this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Flavio Leone is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Gerardo Gatti has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
Marco Rosafio 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.
500 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Altamura will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Altamura they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
Abba Khalid 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Altamura can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Altamura will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Altamura can pretend not to have heard.
Marco Rosafio 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.
Squad3 Mar 2031
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Roberto Pirrello 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.
Successful dribbles: 17. 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.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 9 actions, 6.75, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Altamura will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Valur for Nils Balagušs 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Altamura this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
Squad24 Feb 2031
Abba Khalid 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Marco Rosafio 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Audace Cerignola have kept their man, and Altamura go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
0‑1 to Cosenza, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad13 Jan 2031
Abba Khalid 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.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Altamura will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Abba Khalid 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 supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Altamura this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
50 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Michele Grande at his very best
SquadWords at Altamura training over how hard people work
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mattia Florio will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Altamura the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
100 times in these colours, in all weathers and under four or five different managers. That kind of service is quietly disappearing from the game.
The dugout25 Nov 2030
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 Interim Coach left the room before anybody could ask which.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Altamura is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Abba Khalid was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Altamura, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Potenza next, and one man in the Altamura dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Roko Tudor is on it.
Two goals and a mark of 8.89 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Cristian De Angelis. 2‑1 against Casertana, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad21 Oct 2030
Abba Khalid 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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Interim Coach could afford to be generous.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Martin Plavec Marković has his answer from Altamura; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alessandro Pentima is on it.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Alessandro Pentima: 3 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
9 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Altamura will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Altamura they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Player ratings30 Sep 2030
A brace, and Mattia Florio takes the afternoon — 7.95
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mattia Florio provided it, and the 7.95 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Altamura will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
Successful dribbles: 24. 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.
Alessandro Pentima 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 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 1‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Altamura will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Altamura have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Altamura they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Altamura 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.
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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Altamura will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Tibério Cunha will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Altamura the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Marco Rosafio 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 phone has started ringing about Jason Kodor again, and this time the name on the line is Ascoli. Altamura are listening politely and promising nothing.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 57 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 Altamura, and it is not being withdrawn.
At 23 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.
Giuseppe Simone 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.
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.
Boardroom26 Aug 2030
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Altamura
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Marco Rocca has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Francesco Zorzi has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Ciro Dalla Valle has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Altamura will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Giugliano waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Altamura is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Marco Rosafio and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad29 Jul 2030
Words at Altamura training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Abba Khalid 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.
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Cristian De Angelis trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Sven Sopić has his answer from Altamura; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Cristian De Angelis signs something — a contract at Altamura or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.