The Udinese Sentinel
Squad11 Aug 2031
Pierluigi Gollini damages knee ligaments — 48 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
Market11 Aug 2031
Rocco Vata agrees terms with Lazio
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Udinese people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market11 Aug 2031
Riccardo De Zen hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Udinese can pretend not to have heard.
Market11 Aug 2031
Only the photograph left for Giacomo Cavallini
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Giacomo Cavallini will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Udinese the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Boardroom11 Aug 2031
Still no name above the door at Udinese
Day 41 of the vacancy. Candidates have been priced, sounded out and quietly ruled out — and the caretaker’s win ratio is becoming an argument all by itself.
Squad11 Aug 2031
Tempers go at Udinese
Thomas Kristensen 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.
Squad11 Aug 2031
Danilo Treffiletti is a better footballer than he was
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.
Squad11 Aug 2031
A row about effort at Udinese
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jordan Zemura was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets11 Aug 2031
A loan move for Babis Kostoulas is in the works
Udinese have made the call to Napoli. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
In brief
- Market The Maduka Okoye question follows Udinese around
- The dugout Rocco Vata has been promised minutes
- The dugout Edoardo Morucci knocks on the manager's door