Marked for Ionuţ Cercel
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match7 Aug 2027
No end in sight to Pandurii's wait for a win
19 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Pandurii has to find a result from somewhere.
The terraces9 Aug 2027
Anger at Pandurii spills outside the ground
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.
Squad9 Aug 2027
44 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Pandurii lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Robert Ćosić breaks a bone — 52 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 52 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The dugout9 Aug 2027
“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.
Squad9 Aug 2027
At 18, Florin Puscas is already the best thing here
An average of 6.55 in a first team he is several years too young for. Pandurii have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Market9 Aug 2027
Steven Fortes has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Pandurii they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market9 Aug 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 The request is on a desk at Pandurii, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad9 Aug 2027
A falling-out at Pandurii
Ionut Keseru and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad5 Jul 2027
A fracture rules Robert Ćosić out for 90 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pandurii will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom5 Jul 2027
The club looked outside for a month, found nothing it preferred, and handed the job to the man who had been doing it anyway. He knows the building; now he has to prove he knows the rest.
Market5 Jul 2027
The bid was some way short and Pandurii did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad5 Jul 2027
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.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2027
The deal with FCSB 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.
Squad5 Jul 2027
Words exchanged at Pandurii
Ionut Keseru 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 targets5 Jul 2027
Pandurii have gone to Astra 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.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2027
$68.0K was the most the club would pay and Botosani were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Squad5 Jul 2027
A row about effort at Pandurii
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ionuţ Cercel was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market14 Jun 2027
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. FCSB have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Mimito Biai gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Mimito Biai has just signed for FCSB, and for once the answer mattered.
Market14 Jun 2027
The paperwork is done: Mimito Biai joins from Voluntari in a deal worth $530.0K. Now comes the harder part.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Tempers go at FCSB
Juri Cisotti 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.
Squad14 Jun 2027
At 20 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.
Market14 Jun 2027
Pandurii pay $230.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
FCSB asked and Olympiacos said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The dugout14 Jun 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to André Duarte, and the manager let it.
Loan watch14 Jun 2027
33 appearances away from home and 11 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Boardroom7 Jun 2027
Four paragraphs on the club website, none of them about football. The board thanked him, wished him well, and had the search under way before the page went up.
Squad7 Jun 2027
A fracture rules Sergiu Coman out for 115 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pandurii will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market7 Jun 2027
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Pandurii have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Market7 Jun 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Boardroom7 Jun 2027
“Somebody has to pick the team on Saturday, and this week that is me.” An interim appointment with no promises attached, which is how most of them start.
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 Pandurii, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad7 Jun 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ionut Keseru and Pandurii agree another 5 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Transfer targets7 Jun 2027
Pandurii have gone to FCSB 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.
Transfer targets7 Jun 2027
Pandurii have gone to Dinamo Bucharest 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.