“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Botosani can pretend not to have heard.
Everything agreed with Rapid Bucharest, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The phone has started ringing about Lorenzo Youndjé again, and this time the name on the line is Kampaniakos. Botosani are listening politely and promising nothing.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Giannis Anestis 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 Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Botosani, another week without a signature from Zoran Mitrov.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 16 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 The request is on a desk at Botosani, and it is not being withdrawn.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 Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 May 2028
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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 tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Botosani can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Nobody at Botosani 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Botosani, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Botosani will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 49 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Botosani 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.
“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 Botosani know it.
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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Dominik Kościelniak has just signed for Botosani, and for once the answer mattered.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Oumar Sidibé commits to Botosani for another 3 years.
Squad13 Dec 2027
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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 Botosani 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.
“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; Botosani are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
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 Andrei Dumitru is on it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Petrolul Ploiești in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Botosani would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
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 not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Botosani told Alexander Murillo something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
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.
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 used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Dinamo Bucharest in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 17 arrived, 11 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Olympiacos is saying, and nobody at Botosani is enjoying the guessing.
Giannis Anestis 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.
Squad6 Sep 2027
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Olympiacos have kept their man, and Botosani go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“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; Botosani are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
A 3‑2 win over CSC Dumbrăvița, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Match18 Aug 2027
Andrei Dumitru wins it after the whistle should have gone
103 minutes played. Andrei Dumitru found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and CSC Dumbrăvița went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Andrei Dumitru provided it, and the 7.97 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 Botosani, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Botosani have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Botosani have done the hard part with Red Bull Salzburg, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Botosani had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Red Bull Salzburg, 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 Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Giannis Anestis was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Giannis Anestis was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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 Botosani know 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 Botosani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Botosani, another week without a signature from Zoran Mitrov.
Viktoria Plzen have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Kryštof Daněk is in the works
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mykola Kovtaliuk provided it, and the 8.77 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Botosani and Universitatea Cluj in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Botosani training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hervin Ongenda 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 happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 36 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
“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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
8 new faces, and Botosani 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.