Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Debrecen waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Paksi is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. MTK Budapest have kept their man, and Paksi 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 Paksi they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Zsombor Molnár has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
József Windecker and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gergő Gyurkits was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Paksi are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Paksi have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Paksi can pretend not to have heard.
Paksi and Ferencvaros have settled on $710.0K. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
Paksi asked and Honved 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 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.
Puskas Akademia will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Brandon Ndezi has pre-agreed a move to Paksi, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
József Windecker 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.
Nobody at Paksi 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.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Paksi will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
61 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.
14 games now with at least two against. The back line has been rearranged, the goalkeeper has been backed publicly, and the goals keep going in anyway.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Paksi can pretend not to have heard.
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.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Paksi can tell you which week it ends in.
57 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 12 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
10 games now with at least two against. The back line has been rearranged, the goalkeeper has been backed publicly, and the goals keep going in anyway.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Paksi can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Kevin Mondovics and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
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.
Both clubs in the mire, one fixture between them, and a ground that will be louder and more frightened than at any point in the season. Paksi know what is at stake and so does everybody in the away end.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
József Windecker and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The manager kept them in and said what needed saying. A response is expected on Saturday, and if it does not come the questions move upstairs.
The dugout23 Sep 2030
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑4 defeat, delivered by Interim Coach to a room that had heard them before.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Paksi will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
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.
Paksi have gone to Vasas with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
József Windecker 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.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Puskas Akademia have kept their man, and Paksi go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad22 Jul 2030
Péter Molnár 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.
Honved have accepted the money. What Paksi do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Paksi have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gergő Gyurkits 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. Ferencvaros have kept their man, and Paksi go back to a list with one name crossed off 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 Paksi, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The table has started to be checked before the results are in, and that is always the tell. Nobody at Paksi says the word out loud, and everybody in the building is thinking it.