Marked for Manuel Tirelli
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad14 Sep 2026
Nehemías Almaraz 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 Sep 2026
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Francesco Proietto 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.
Match12 Sep 2026
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad14 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Luca Fabrizi
“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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Marco Bertini dropped after a run of poor form
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market24 Aug 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad24 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Pianese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom24 Aug 2026
Graduation day at Pianese
1 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Simone Ianesi 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.
Market24 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Nicolò Andreoli is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Boardroom24 Aug 2026
Pianese turn down the training-ground plan
It is the quietest way a club tells you what its ambitions are. The money was asked for, the money was refused, and the people who work there every day now know exactly where they stand.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market17 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Francesco Proietto 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Leonardo Bellini 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.