“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Teplice have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Sampdoria is saying, and nobody at Teplice is enjoying the guessing.
Teplice asked and České Budějovice said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Teplice this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad23 Aug 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tomáš Zlatohlávek 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 nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Teplice can pretend not to have heard.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Lokomotiv have kept their man, and Teplice go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Teplice they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tomáš Zlatohlávek 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.
Serigne Fallou Mbacké Coly is 20, and Teplice have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Robert Jukl 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.
Teplice asked and Slavia Prague said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The words a physio says slowly. 20 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dukla Prague have kept their man, and Teplice 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 Tomáš Zlatohlávek was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Teplice this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Jaroslav Harušťák has his answer from Teplice; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Squad2 Aug 2027
7 new faces, and Teplice 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.
35 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Teplice lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 27 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Teplice is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Ladislav Krejčí 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.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Michal Bílek 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.
Teplice asked and Spartak Moscow said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Karel Cerny 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.
83 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Teplice lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Teplice will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about 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.
“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 Teplice, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Slavia Kroměříž waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Teplice is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Teplice asked and Slavia Prague said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The name of Matěj Náprstek has come up in conversations Teplice were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Michal Bílek was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
114 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Teplice lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Teplice will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad10 May 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tomáš Zlatohlávek 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.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout10 May 2027
Marek Beránek 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.
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 Matej Riznič is on 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 Teplice, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Teplice this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tomáš Zlatohlávek 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.
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.
Nobody at Teplice 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Teplice 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 Jaroslav Harušťák trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 Teplice will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
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.
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Michal Bílek 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Teplice this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout15 Mar 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Marek Beránek'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.
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.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Teplice has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
The words a physio says slowly. 15 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.
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 Teplice this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Teplice asked and Dukla Prague said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ales Coufal after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
“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 Teplice, and it is not being withdrawn.
11 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Olympiacos is saying, and nobody at Teplice is enjoying the guessing.
At 23 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.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Teplice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tomáš Zlatohlávek 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.41 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 23 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.
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.
Petr Kodeš 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.
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 2‑2 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Matej Riznič obliged against Slovacko. 2‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Teplice.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. MFK Skalica have kept their man, and Teplice 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.
Marked 8.00 — 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.
Successful dribbles: 17. 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.