Marked for Pius Igwe
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match14 Jun 2027
Every point is an argument now for Sibenik
Position 8 and 18 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.
Market14 Jun 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad14 Jun 2027
The step up is real for Niko Ljubić
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
Everything agreed with Zadar, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad14 Jun 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Pius Igwe and Sibenik agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Toni Španja 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 Jun 2027
A row about effort at Sibenik
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marko Đira was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
The dugout14 Jun 2027
The manager makes an example of Pius Igwe
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad7 Jun 2027
Toni Španja in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sibenik this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Mauro Ibarra is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad7 Jun 2027
A row about effort at Sibenik
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mihael Rebernik was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad7 Jun 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Lucas Soratto and Sibenik agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Transfer targets7 Jun 2027
A loan enquiry to Cherno More: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout7 Jun 2027
Marco Russo is still being punished for one mistake
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.
The dugout7 Jun 2027
Pius Igwe knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Pius Igwe trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The dugout7 Jun 2027
The manager makes an example of Jakov Miholić
“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.
Market7 Jun 2027
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sibenik know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad3 May 2027
106 days out for Faton Krasnići after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Sibenik will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The terraces3 May 2027
The mood at Sibenik 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.
Market3 May 2027
Only the photograph left for Josip Baturina
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Josip Baturina will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sibenik the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad3 May 2027
A falling-out at Sibenik
Toni Španja and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 May 2027
“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; Sibenik are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Sibenik training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marko Đira 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market8 Mar 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sibenik is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad8 Mar 2027
A move Pius Igwe would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Pius Igwe is living that version at Sibenik, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad8 Mar 2027
14 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Toni Španja and Sibenik agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Toni Španja in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sibenik this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout8 Mar 2027
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.