Marked for Dilan Guzman
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match19 Feb 2028
The wait goes on for Vicenza
12 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.
Market21 Feb 2028
“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 The request is on a desk at Vicenza, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match19 Feb 2028
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad21 Feb 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vicenza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Loan watch21 Feb 2028
“I did not go to Oviedo to sit and watch. I want to come back to Vicenza and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 32 matches say the rest.
The dugout21 Feb 2028
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 0‑1, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
Player ratings21 Feb 2028
Successful dribbles: 15. 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 dugout21 Feb 2028
The manager makes an example of Dilan Guzman
“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 dugout21 Feb 2028
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market7 Feb 2028
The unthinkable, invoiced: Andrea Papetti sold
Napoli arrived with $11.6M and left with the best player in the building. The board will call it business; the queue at the ticket office will use other words.
Match5 Feb 2028
10 matches without a win for Vicenza
The run now stands at 10, and the questions being asked around Vicenza are no longer polite ones.
The terraces7 Feb 2028
Andrea Papetti has gone, the accounts have $11.6M in them, and the supporters have the feeling of having been sold something themselves. Good business and a good decision are not always the same thing.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
Window shuts: 8 in, 5 out at Vicenza
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 8 arrived, 5 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Words exchanged at Vicenza
Alesandro Comita 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.
Transfer targets7 Feb 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Virtus Entella have kept their man, and Vicenza go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The dugout7 Feb 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Eduart Rroca, and the manager let it.
Match5 Feb 2028
A bad afternoon for Vicenza against Empoli
0‑1 to Empoli, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad7 Feb 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Dilan Guzman and Vicenza agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market20 Dec 2027
Thomas Sandon 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 Vicenza can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
This is not rotation. Silvio Merkaj has not been in the manager's plans for some time, and nobody at Vicenza is pretending otherwise.
Market20 Dec 2027
Andrea Papetti wants to know where this is going
“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 Vicenza hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad20 Dec 2027
The step up is real for Marco Oliva
At 22 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.
Squad20 Dec 2027
Words at Vicenza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gianni Vadacca 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.
Player ratings20 Dec 2027
A mark of 7.68, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Player ratings20 Dec 2027
Defensive actions: 16, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Sergio Marchetti chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Squad20 Dec 2027
A booking nobody needed, on a night the game was already won. Vicenza lose a player for the most avoidable reason there is.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market13 Dec 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vicenza can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout13 Dec 2027
Germán Mansilla: 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.” Vicenza have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market13 Dec 2027
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.
Squad13 Dec 2027
Words at Vicenza training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Germán Mansilla 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.
Player ratings13 Dec 2027
Marked 7.67. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
Squad13 Dec 2027
Words exchanged at Vicenza
Dilan Guzman 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.
Match11 Dec 2027
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout13 Dec 2027
“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 dugout13 Dec 2027
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Sergio Marchetti chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match23 Oct 2027
4 matches without a win for Vicenza
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Vicenza are no longer polite ones.
Squad25 Oct 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Andrea Papetti commits to Vicenza for another 4 years.
Match23 Oct 2027
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad25 Oct 2027
“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; Vicenza are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Germán Mansilla 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 dugout25 Oct 2027
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Sergio Marchetti after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Dilan Guzman 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 dugout25 Oct 2027
“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 dugout25 Oct 2027
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vicenza, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match22 Sep 2027
Raffaele Sibilio wins it after the whistle should have gone
92 minutes played. Raffaele Sibilio found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Ospitaletto went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
No sign of nerves from Raffaele Sibilio at 21 — 8.02
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Raffaele Sibilio did not need any: 8.02, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Marco Oliva is a better footballer than he was
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.
The terraces27 Sep 2027
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 ratings27 Sep 2027
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.15, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Gianni Vadacca 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.
Match25 Sep 2027
Vicenza rescue it on 89 minutes
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 89. Union Brescia had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
The dugout27 Sep 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad31 May 2027
A fracture rules Filippo Costa out for 132 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Vicenza will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom31 May 2027
Pressure builds in the Vicenza boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Match29 May 2027
The wait goes on for Vicenza
4 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.
Squad31 May 2027
A falling-out at Vicenza
Alesandro Comita and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout31 May 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alesandro Comita, and the manager let it.
Squad31 May 2027
A row about effort at Vicenza
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gianni Vadacca was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match29 May 2027
A point taken on 88 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
Match29 May 2027
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout31 May 2027
“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.