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 Carrarese have had the benefit of it.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Carrarese they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Ignacio Mercado 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Jacopo Martini trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Carrarese told Santiago Campione something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Rahul Sharma 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Rahul Sharma 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.
Marked 8.45 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The dugout8 Apr 2030
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.” Anthony Mitchell kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Carrarese told Stefano Mazzini something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ignacio Mercado trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Jacopo Martini’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Carrarese needing him to play as if none of it matters.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Carrarese would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Carrarese is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Ignacio Mercado 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Carrarese has been clear about where Jacopo Martini stands, which is more than many ever get.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Carrarese told Jacopo Martini something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Carrarese, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Salernitana in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Carrarese would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
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 Francesco Pio Attanasio is on it.
Ignacio Mercado 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 Carrarese has been clear about where Nicolás Schiavi stands, which is more than many ever get.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 10 combined actions and a mark of 6.72, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
Something was said to Malik Djibril and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Anthony Mitchell on a 2‑1 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Carrarese, and both men came out saying it was fine.
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Vanja Vlahović has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
Ignacio Mercado 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.
The name of Jakob Schragl has come up in conversations Carrarese were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Carrarese ran out of time with Campobasso. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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 Jakob Schragl is on it.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and Carrarese have no good answer.
The clubs have shaken hands with Campobasso; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Boardroom4 Feb 2030
Carrarese close the window on a squad of their own making
0 in and 1 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jallal-Dine Yansané will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Carrarese the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The deal with Juventus 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.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Casertana keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Stefano Mazzini is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The words a physio says slowly. 24 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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Carrarese have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Carrarese offered $31.0K; Campobasso said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
6 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Picerno were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Palermo have kept their man, and Carrarese go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Carrarese have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Half the programme played, position 7, 21 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
Something was said to Vanja Vlahović and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Successful dribbles: 12. 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.
Marked 6.86 on 10 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Stefano Mazzini trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Successful dribbles: 10. 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Carrarese they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
0‑2 to Salernitana, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout17 Dec 2029
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Anthony Mitchell left the room before anybody could ask which.
7 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.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Foggia in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Nobody at Carrarese 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Vanja Vlahović provided it, and the 9.02 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Nicolás Schiavi 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.
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.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Carrarese will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
The award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Carrarese have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Fabio Andrea Ruggeri is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
7.90, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Nicolás Schiavi 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 won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 9 combined actions and a mark of 7.22, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Anthony Mitchell could afford to be generous.
Successful dribbles: 13. 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Carrarese have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Jacopo Martini 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.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Carrarese can tell you which week it ends in.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Armani Babah commits to Carrarese for another 4 years.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Anthony Mitchell to a room that had heard them before.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Carrarese will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Elia Galletti is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Vanja Vlahović trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The mood at Carrarese has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Involvement in 2 goals, from a player who spent the ninety minutes doing the thing a manager actually wants: being where the ball was going to end up. 7.99 beside his name.
Ignacio Mercado 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 now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bari have kept their man, and Carrarese go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Vanja Vlahović. 2‑1 against Potenza, 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.
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.
5 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
In brief
The dugoutThe view from the dugout
The dugoutRahul Sharma knocks on the manager’s door
He arrived for a fee and leaves for a fraction of it. $50.6K of what Carrarese paid for Matteo Papaccioli is money the club will not see again, and the boardroom will be asked about it for two seasons.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 9 arrived, 12 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The phone has started ringing about Jakob Schragl again, and this time the name on the line is Vicenza. Carrarese are listening politely and promising nothing.
Rahul Sharma 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.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Carrarese will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Carrarese, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Rahul Sharma has written the date down.
“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 Carrarese will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
30 graduates, from a department now rated 7 out of 20. Nothing about the academy appears in a result, and nothing about the club’s future exists without it.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Carrarese, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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.
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
“Judge me on him.” Managers do not say that kind of thing by accident — it moves the pressure from Matteo Papaccioli’s shoulders onto his own, and both of them know it.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Anthony Mitchell has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Ignacio Mercado is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
9 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Words at Carrarese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Breiner Urbina 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 the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Carrarese will try again when the window opens; Torino may not be selling by then.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Elia Galletti has just signed for Carrarese, and for once the answer mattered.
Carrarese had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Venezia, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Gabriele Parlanti has his answer from Carrarese; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Squad11 Sep 2028
10 new faces, and Carrarese 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.
The clubs have shaken hands with Hellas Verona; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Jakob Schragl reports back to Carrarese with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
8 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Catanzaro have kept their man, and Carrarese go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. Carrarese will quote 15 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 46 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Fabio Abiuso was one of the reasons people came, and $6.2M does not replace that by itself.
The offer from Union Brescia for Nicola Ravaglia 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 now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Parma have kept their man, and Carrarese 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 David Vujević was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Carrarese have made the call to Südtirol. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.