Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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 Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Francesco Cucciniello 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.
Marked 5.44. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bra they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Enrico Baldini 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Bra they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bra have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Tommaso Chiavarino is living that version at Bra, and it tends to show in the first month.
Enrico Baldini 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried 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 Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dino Mehic 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.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Bra pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
It needed Tommaso Maressa to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Sambenedettese, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Jacopo Sassi signs something — a contract at Bra or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Dino Mehic 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.
0‑1 to Campobasso, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Filippo Nardi falls out with a teammate over standards
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. Bra told Franklyn Akammadu something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alessandro Fiordaliso signs something — a contract at Bra or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Marked 5.67. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Bra is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Filippo Nardi 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.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Ismet Sinani.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bra have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Dino Mehic 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eros De Santis 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 crowd waited for a goal that never came. Gubbio defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Jacopo Sassi signs something — a contract at Bra or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bra 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.” Bra have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
4 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 Bra 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
22 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Samuel Cuka 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.
17 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.
Nobody at Bra 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Afonso Sambú 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bra 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Afonso Sambú 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.
14 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.
Enrico Baldini 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Afonso Sambú 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bra have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Audace Cerignola paid $230.0K and Bra took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eid Al-Hammadi 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 was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Bra has been clear about where Alessandro Fiordaliso stands, which is more than many ever get.
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.
Enrico Baldini 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Bra training over how hard people work
“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 Bra, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
13 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bra have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The words a physio says slowly. 24 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bra can pretend not to have heard.
Two goals and a mark of 8.44 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“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 Bra, 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 Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Franklyn Akammadu. 2‑1 against Ascoli, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
0‑3 to Perugia, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
“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 Bra, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Bra can tell you which week it ends in.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bra this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Afonso Sambú falls out with a teammate over standards
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. Bra told Riccardo Sganzerla something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.