“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Hamrun Spartans can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hamrun Spartans have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Hamrun Spartans they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Matthew Guillaumier 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 had been thinking. Sihle Tati 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 dugout1 Nov 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Danilo Bulevardi's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
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 Laurenţiu Brănescu is on it.
Successful dribbles: 14. 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Hernanny
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Hamrun Spartans lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Jerryson Willie scored in the 86th minute, Gzira United had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Hamrun Spartans took the lot.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hamrun Spartans this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Jerryson Willie. 1‑0 against Gzira United, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
Marked 7.57. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
The dugout18 Oct 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Lawrence Chetcuti kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Nobody at Hamrun Spartans 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.
32 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Hamrun Spartans lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hamrun Spartans have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Hamrun Spartans they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Danilo Bulevardi 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 Sihle Tati was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Hamrun Spartans 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.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Gudja United waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Hamrun Spartans 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 Hamrun Spartans is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Sheffield Wednesday have kept their man, and Hamrun Spartans go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vincenzo Polito was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Jan Kniat 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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Santa Lucia will make the call about Rafael Compri this week. Hamrun Spartans have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
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 loan enquiry to Rotherham United: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Hamrun Spartans people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of 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 Hamrun Spartans this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Tranmere Rovers have kept their man, and Hamrun Spartans go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vincenzo Polito was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Hamrun Spartans have made the call to Sheffield Wednesday. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Bristol Rovers have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
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 Laurenţiu Brănescu is on it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Hamrun Spartans have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“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 Hamrun Spartans, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Hamrun Spartans they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sihle Tati was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
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 loan enquiry to Blackburn Rovers: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Ryan McAidoo is in the works
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hamrun Spartans 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 Vincenzo Polito was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Hamrun Spartans know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Jerryson Willie trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
48 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hamrun Spartans have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Hamrun Spartans they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Matthew Guillaumier 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. Thato Mokeke 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 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 Hamrun Spartans know it.
Nobody at Hamrun Spartans 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Hamrun Spartans, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Hamrun Spartans know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“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 Hamrun Spartans, and it is not being withdrawn.
Matthew Guillaumier and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Sihle Tati 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 will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
21 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Hamrun Spartans lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hamrun Spartans have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Sifiso Mazibuko has, at Hamrun Spartans, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hamrun Spartans this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Sifiso Mazibuko and Hamrun Spartans agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Matthew Guillaumier’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Hamrun Spartans needing him to play as if none of it matters.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Matthew Guillaumier signs something — a contract at Hamrun Spartans or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
42 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Hamrun Spartans lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A 2‑1 win over Tarxien Rainbows, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Tarxien Rainbows spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Hamrun Spartans will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Lawrence Chetcuti could afford to be generous.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.06 at 37, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Danilo Bulevardi 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Thato Mokeke and Hamrun Spartans agree another 1 years.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Michele Carboni 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.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.16, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Rafael Compri was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.06. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The young player of the month award goes to a 21-year-old at Hamrun Spartans who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
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.
“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 Hamrun Spartans know it.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Shots: 13. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
Floriana next, and one man in the Hamrun Spartans dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought 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 Hamrun Spartans can pretend not to have heard.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Yankho Singo has, at Hamrun Spartans, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Everything was agreed with another club and then the doctor spoke. Hamrun Spartans have walked away from a signing on the advice of somebody who never saw him play, which is how it is supposed to work.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 10 arrived, 0 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Yankho Singo and Hamrun Spartans agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Ipalibo Jack is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
Squad7 Sep 2026
10 new faces, and Hamrun Spartans are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Hamrun Spartans, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Hamrun Spartans know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.