Marked for Loukas Stamellos
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market8 Jan 2029
Doxa say no — this time
The offer from Apollon for Vukašin Jovanović was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Market8 Jan 2029
Ahmet Koşar has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Doxa they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market8 Jan 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
The dugout8 Jan 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Doxa may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Words exchanged at Doxa
Danilo Miladinović 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.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Mateo Pérez 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.
Boardroom8 Jan 2029
$442.5K of the owner's money at Doxa
The shortfall was covered from upstairs again. Supporters are entitled to be relieved and entitled to ask what happens the month it is not, and both feelings usually arrive together.
Transfer targets8 Jan 2029
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Boardroom8 Jan 2029
No signings allowed at Doxa
The manager may talk to whoever he likes and may pay nobody. A squad survives a window like this by borrowing, by promoting, and by hoping the injuries land somewhere else.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market18 Sep 2028
Only the photograph left for Ahmet Koşar
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ahmet Koşar will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Doxa the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad18 Sep 2028
Words exchanged at Doxa
Danilo Miladinović 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.
Boardroom18 Sep 2028
The approach has been made to Warri Wolves and the answer is somebody else's to give. These things are settled in private and reported in public, usually in that order.
Squad18 Sep 2028
Panagiotis Markou 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.
Transfer targets18 Sep 2028
Doxa asked and Panetolikos said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Boardroom18 Sep 2028
Embargo at Doxa
No fees may be paid for anybody, whatever the squad needs. Every rumour about this club until it lifts is a rumour about a deal that cannot be done.
The dugout18 Sep 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alex Szamboti, and the manager let it.
Squad18 Sep 2028
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Doxa can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Market18 Sep 2028
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market11 Sep 2028
“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 Doxa, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Kostas Batos arrives at the club he grew up with
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Kostas Batos has, at Doxa, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Transfer targets11 Sep 2028
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad11 Sep 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Doxa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom11 Sep 2028
The target is the manager, the approach is real, and the compensation clause is the whole conversation. Clubs deny this kind of story right up until the photograph.
Boardroom11 Sep 2028
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Transfer targets11 Sep 2028
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Words at Doxa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mateo Pérez 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.
Boardroom11 Sep 2028
Doxa are $14.9M in the red
The borrowing is past what the bank agreed, which is the line where a debt stops being how football is financed and starts being a problem. Every phone-in in this town will quote the figure for the next five years.