Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 35 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Kelyann Bezahaf will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Lecco the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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.
Flavio Junčaj 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.
13 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Lecco 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.” Lecco have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Lecco will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Two goals and a mark of 8.01 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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. 4 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Flavio Junčaj is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
At 24 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Lecco training over how hard people work
Position 3, 63 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Lecco heard it as anything else.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Matteo Polonioli has agreed terms with Pergolettese for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
63 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Player ratings15 May 2028
Lazar Jovanović, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.65
A mark of 8.65 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.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Leon Šipoš. 2‑0 against Arzignano, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
10 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bologna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Lazar Jovanović, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.00
A mark of 8.00 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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.
Squad8 May 2028
Getting past Jacopo Furlan has become the hardest job in the division
13 clean sheets and counting. Forwards used to back themselves here; now they shoot early, shoot wide, and look for somebody to blame.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Lazar Jovanović 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 board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
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. Lecco will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
31 appearances and 18 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.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lecco 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 Lecco, and it is not being withdrawn.
A season average of 7.23 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Lecco know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
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 Bologna 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.
17 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.
9 goals in 25 games at Lecco — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Bologna updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Thijs Dallinga signs something — a contract at Bologna or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Flavio Junčaj did not need any: 8.85, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
17 goals in 29 games at Lumezzane — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Lecco updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Antonio Metlika 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.
Flavio Junčaj 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Flavio Junčaj 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.
Match8 Apr 2028
Another one collected away from home
3 on the bounce on the road for Lecco. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
16 goals in 28 games at Lumezzane — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Lecco updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lecco have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings20 Mar 2028
Lazar Jovanović, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.53
A mark of 8.53 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 Lecco can pretend not to have heard.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
10 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.
15 goals in 26 games at Lumezzane — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Lecco updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bologna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Bologna hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 22 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Shots: 8. 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.
Flavio Junčaj, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 9.06
A mark of 9.06 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.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for 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 Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Gabriel Pellegrino 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.
8.22. 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.
Position 2, 47 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.
He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday. The order of those three tells you everything about what a football club actually values.
A season average of 7.23 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Lecco know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
9 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
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.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.07, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The words a physio says slowly. 36 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.
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.
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.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 6.79 for the rest of it.
Player ratings7 Feb 2028
Up for the corner, and Jhon Lucumí delivers — 7.97
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Jhon Lucumí scored, was marked 7.97, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Position 2 and 41 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Player ratings7 Feb 2028
Flavio Junčaj, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.79
A mark of 8.79 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.
He is 21, he is averaging 7.27, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.17 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings31 Jan 2028
Enoch Mastoras, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.02
A mark of 8.02 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Antonio Metlika 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. Enoch Mastoras 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.
“I watch every Lecco game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Guidonia Montecelio runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Flavio Junčaj did not need any: 8.36, 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 Lecco, and it is not being withdrawn.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
At 20 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.
91 minutes played. Lazar Jovanović found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Giana Erminio went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Lazar Jovanović did not need any: 8.97, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Lecco can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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 hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Lazar Jovanović did not need any: 9.12, 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 Lecco, and it is not being withdrawn.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 20 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Lazar Jovanović did not need any: 8.98, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Lazar Jovanović did not need any: 8.79, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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: Guillaume Furrer. 2‑1 against Vicenza, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Marked 8.14 — 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bologna 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.
Marked 8.33 — 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.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Bologna told Emil Holm something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Flavio Junčaj, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 9.14
A mark of 9.14 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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. Lazar Jovanović 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.
6 goals in 12 games at Lumezzane — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Lecco updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Łukasz Skorupski 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bologna is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The unbeaten run reaches 7. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad22 Nov 2027
Words at Bologna training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Riccardo Orsolini 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.
Inter made Bologna work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings22 Nov 2027
Jonathan Rowe was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.54. 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.
Marked 8.43 — 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.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I watch every Lecco game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Guidonia Montecelio runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Enoch Mastoras has come out of that comparison in the side, and Lecco have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
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.
Player ratings18 Oct 2027
A brace, and Martin Vitík takes the afternoon — 8.44
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Martin Vitík provided it, and the 8.44 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody 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 Bologna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bologna they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Martin Vitík in the middle of it, and Pisa unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
“I watch every Bologna game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Lecco runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
In brief
The terracesEverybody has an opinion about Thijs Dallinga
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lecco have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Flavio Junčaj did not need any: 9.12, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The terraces27 Sep 2027
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 9 of the 30 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
28 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.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bologna is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Jens Odgaard. 2‑1 against Genoa, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“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 Bologna, and 2 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around Lecco are no longer polite ones.
Player ratings30 Aug 2027
Lazar Jovanović, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.67
A mark of 7.67 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.
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.
Enoch Mastoras 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.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Marwane Kritta has improved at 25, which nobody expected
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Lazar Jovanović 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.
“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 Lecco, and it is not being withdrawn.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lecco this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
At 27 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guillaume Furrer 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.
Flavio Junčaj 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 25 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 am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Lecco, and 0 appearances in 5 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 Bologna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Emil Holm wants continental football; whether Bologna can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ismaël Konaté is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Edoardo Duca 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 fee is $8.9M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Lecce drove a hard bargain; time will say who won 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 Bologna this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Bologna heard it as anything else.
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“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 Bologna, 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.” Bologna have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“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 Bologna hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Riccardo Orsolini 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. Francesco Castaldo is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
In brief
SquadLewis Ferguson falls out with a teammate over standards