1‑1 against Aris Thessaloniki, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Bendegúz Kovács did not need any: 7.73, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad18 Sep 2028
Matěj Šín 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Bendegúz Kovács 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 hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Bendegúz Kovács did not need any: 7.73, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Patati 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Adama Camara is living that version at AZ, and it tends to show in the first month.
The offer from De Graafschap for Ro-Zangelo Daal 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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.
Troy Parrott 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.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Wouter Goes has improved at 24, 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at AZ, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what AZ can pretend not to have heard.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bendegúz Kovács is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Rome-Jayden Owusu-Oduro 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Peer Koopmeiners 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.
29 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. AZ 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 AZ can pretend not to have heard.
Rome-Jayden Owusu-Oduro 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Peer Koopmeiners 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Palermo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Words at Palermo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tommaso Augello 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 is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Palermo told Matteo Brunori something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Harry Cornick will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Palermo the goodbyes have quietly begun.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Mattia Bani will call it something else in private.
“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.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Jacopo Segre 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 easiest signature of my career.” Sebastiano Desplanches and Palermo agree another 5 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Palermo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
9 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Palermo can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Palermo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Palermo know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Patati 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.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Kees Smit 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.
“I watch every AZ game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Palermo runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Position 19 and 15 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Position 19, 15 points, and a crowd that arrives already braced. Relegation seasons are lost in exactly this atmosphere, and everybody who has lived through one recognises it immediately.
Mattia Bani 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 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.
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 ambition story running the other way, and the one nobody tells: a footballer asking for a smaller stage, fewer cameras and a crowd that does not turn. It is not weakness and it is very rarely reported as anything 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 Palermo, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Kenneth Taylor 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.
“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.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Words at Palermo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thapelo Maseko 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 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.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Palermo know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
19 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.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Peer Koopmeiners will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at AZ escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what AZ can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Matěj Šín 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.
Mattia Bani 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.
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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Mehdi Chahiri has his answer from Palermo; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
7 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.
Position 19, 10 points, and a crowd that arrives already braced. Relegation seasons are lost in exactly this atmosphere, and everybody who has lived through one recognises it immediately.
5 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Palermo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Words at Palermo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tommaso Augello 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.
15 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Kees Smit 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín 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.
21 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Mattia Bani 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.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Sebastiano Desplanches signs something — a contract at Palermo or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
Player ratingsAn afternoon Matteo Brunori will want back
Position 20 and 5 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Bendegúz Kovács provided it, and the 8.11 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Sebastiano Desplanches and Palermo agree another 5 years.
Dennis Johnsen 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.
Casper Tengstedt had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Willem II were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
Two goals and a mark of 8.04 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kees Smit 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Palermo will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Monopoli moved on, Giangiacomo Magnani reports back to Palermo, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
Mattia Bani 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Palermo has been clear about where Sebastiano Desplanches stands, which is more than many ever get.
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
Patati 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.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Kees Smit 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at AZ, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Filippo Ranocchia wants continental football; whether Palermo can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bendegúz Kovács is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Shogo Sasaki is living that version at Palermo, and it tends to show in the first month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Palermo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The offer from Viborg for Bendegúz Kovács 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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.
“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 AZ, and it is not being withdrawn.
Patati 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.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Troy Parrott 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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 offer from Roda for Elijah Dijkstra 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 AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 27 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.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Denso Kasius wants continental football; whether AZ can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
The offer from Arezzo for Bendegúz Kovács 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.
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 instruction has come from upstairs rather than from the dugout, which is the version of this conversation no manager enjoys. Somebody in that squad is now available whether the man who picks the team thinks so or not.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at AZ heard it as anything else.
Add another name to the list: De Graafschap have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Ro-Zangelo Daal. The answer from AZ has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kees Smit 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.
Kees Smit 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Peer Koopmeiners 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 33 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Mamadou Coulibaly 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.
Nobody at Clermont Foot 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kees Smit 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at AZ, and 8 appearances in 36 say he has earned the hearing.
9 goals in 30 games at Livorno — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at AZ updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 62 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Clermont Foot this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Patati 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Kees Smit 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.
“I watch every AZ game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Clermont Foot runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 78 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Clermont Foot this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 87 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bendegúz Kovács is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Mamadou Coulibaly 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Clermont Foot this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Clermont Foot will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
2‑1 against Tromso, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Patati provided it, and the 8.71 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Kees Smit, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.66
A mark of 8.66 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ 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.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Matěj Šín.
Marked 2.76. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
Bendegúz Kovács 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.
He is 29, he has been here since he was a boy, and the shirt he grew up expecting has been given to somebody flown in for it. That grievance belongs to the town as much as to the player.
19 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” AZ have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.95 for the rest of it.
“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 AZ hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Alexandre Penetra. 2‑1 against Ajax, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
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 AZ have had the benefit of it.
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.
Patati 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 Ro-Zangelo Daal again, and this time the name on the line is Excelsior. AZ are listening politely and promising nothing.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Clermont Foot have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bendegúz Kovács is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Yoann Salmier 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Clermont Foot this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Clermont Foot pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” AZ have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZ 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 21 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 17 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
“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 AZ hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Kees Smit 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.
23 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.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Seiya Maikuma 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Dean IJssel de Schepper 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at AZ, and 5 appearances in 11 say he has earned the hearing.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Clermont Foot will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.