Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 105 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ben Lhassine Koné provided it, and the 8.70 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Frosinone are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Francesco Folino 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.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Niklas Süle 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ben Lhassine Koné. 2‑1 against Avellino, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 112 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 The request is on a desk at Frosinone, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Sep 2028
Niklas Süle 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 want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Frosinone heard it as anything else.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Frosinone will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Frosinone heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Josip Mišić 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 Frosinone, and 1 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
5 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 Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 34 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.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Frosinone are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Hellas Verona paid $120.0K and Frosinone took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mouhamadou Sarr 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.
16 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Frosinone 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.” Frosinone have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“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 Frosinone, and it is not being withdrawn.
At 25 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 5 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.
5 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Alberto Tedesco has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Marco Giuliani is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
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.
Francesco Folino 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.
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.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Kelyann Bezahaf has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Frosinone have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Frosinone can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Niklas Süle 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.
Squad15 May 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Josip Mišić 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 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.
Donyell Malen 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 want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at AS Roma heard it as anything else.
Shots: 12. 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Robinio Vaz did not need any: 8.30, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Robinio Vaz 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 21, he is averaging 7.02, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Squad8 May 2028
Josip Mišić 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.
Marked 5.04. 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Frosinone have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Francesco Folino 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.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Niklas Süle 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Mees Eppink 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 rules permit it and it stings anyway. Michelangelo Conti has agreed terms with Padova for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Niklas Süle 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.
Kevin Barcella, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.48
A mark of 8.48 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Frosinone can pretend not to have heard.
Francesco Folino 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 Apr 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Josip Mišić 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Robinio Vaz 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.17 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Francesco Folino 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Frosinone and Virtus Entella in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Three points for Frosinone, 4‑2 the final word against Virtus Entella in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Niklas Süle 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Mees Eppink 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.
Kevin Barcella, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.47
A mark of 8.47 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.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Josip Mišić 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.
At 21 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.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Frosinone told Robinio Vaz something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Frosinone have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Robinio Vaz did not need any: 8.09, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“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 Frosinone, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad20 Mar 2028
A last season at home is what Josip Mišić is after
It is sentimental, it is completely genuine, and it is the beginning of a departure nobody has announced. The club can be gracious about it or it can pretend not to have heard.
Marked 7.99. There is a kind of forward whose value only shows up when you count what he was involved in rather than what he finished, and this is the day that argument makes itself.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Niklas Süle 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Robinio Vaz 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.28 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings21 Feb 2028
Robinio Vaz, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.12
A mark of 8.12 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Frosinone 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.” Frosinone have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Cristian De Angelis has agreed terms with Padova for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Francesco Folino 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.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Words at Frosinone training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Niklas Süle 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 offer from Monopoli for Matteo Cichella 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 Frosinone this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Josip Mišić 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.
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“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 Frosinone, and 2 appearances in 26 say he has earned the hearing.
Position 20 and 17 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.
“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 Frosinone, and it is not being withdrawn.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Robinio Vaz will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Frosinone escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
6 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Frosinone has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings7 Feb 2028
Robinio Vaz, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.89
A mark of 7.89 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Frosinone have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Alessandro Tosti is living that version at Frosinone, and it tends to show in the first month.
The deal that would have taken Matteo Pisseri to Salernitana has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Frosinone with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
“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 Frosinone know it.
1‑4 to AC Milan, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AS Roma is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Matías Soulé 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.
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. AS Roma scored in the 93th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 107th minute. Sampdoria will replay every second of the added time for a week.
A brace, and Evan N'Dicka takes the afternoon — 9.00
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Evan N'Dicka provided it, and the 9.00 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. AS Roma will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
“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 AS Roma hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Donyell Malen 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 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about AS Roma and Como in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Evan N'Dicka will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at AS Roma escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Two goals and a mark of 8.09 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what AS Roma can pretend not to have heard.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around AS Roma they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Matías Soulé 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.
“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 AS Roma, and 3 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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.
Squad22 Nov 2027
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Wesley 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.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
13 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.
19 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. AS Roma lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
16 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.85 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
22 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
28 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. AS Roma lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Robinio Vaz will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around AS Roma the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Matías Soulé 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.
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.
Player ratings1 Nov 2027
Santiago Castro was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.11. 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.
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.
12 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Robinio Vaz will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around AS Roma the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Donyell Malen 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.
In brief
Player ratingsTommaso Baldanzi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.13 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AS Roma is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Matías Soulé 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Valerio Cinti is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
At 24 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.
In brief
SquadWesley falls out with a teammate over standards
“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 AS Roma, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
Matías Soulé 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.
8 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.
Matías Soulé 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.
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.
Position 2, 89 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Simone Perucchini has just signed for AS Roma, and for once the answer mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ruben Loftus-Cheek 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 AS Roma, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
The offer from Grasshopper for Mario Hermoso 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.
Matías Soulé 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.
Add another name to the list: Carrarese have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Robinio Vaz. The answer from AS Roma has not changed — yet.
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.
In brief
SquadMile Svilar has become a man the manager trusts
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.
Donyell Malen 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 Niccolò Pisilli again, and this time the name on the line is Reggiana. AS Roma are listening politely and promising nothing.
At 26 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.
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 offer from Paris Saint-Germain for Santiago Castro 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.
Position 2, 89 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking 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 AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Wesley 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.
At 24 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.
“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 AS Roma hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Matías Soulé 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 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.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Santiago Castro 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 name of Robinio Vaz has come up in conversations AS Roma were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
Qualification is done, and next season the floodlights come on for something bigger. A stage for the players, oxygen for the accounts and a passport for everybody else.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. AS Roma will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Donyell Malen 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Antonio Arena is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad31 May 2027
Devyne Rensch 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.
14 appearances and 4 goals away from here, and a player the manager did not have in August. Loans are sent out hoping for exactly this and most of them do not deliver it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.15 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Slim Bouaskar is 17, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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.
14 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” AS Roma have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Donyell Malen 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 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 AS Roma hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Santiago Castro 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 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Marked 8.92 — 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.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Matías Soulé 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 will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
4 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Evan N'Dicka. 2‑0 against Cremonese, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
In brief
SquadWesley falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Sampdoria have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Robinio Vaz. The answer from AS Roma has not changed — yet.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Mile Svilar, and the manager let it.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Wesley 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.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Mile Svilar: 4 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
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 AS Roma this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I watch every AS Roma game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Padova runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Words at AS Roma training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Wesley 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.