Marked for Luis Rivas
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market20 Aug 2035
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market20 Aug 2035
Only the photograph left for Jared Westveer
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jared Westveer will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Roda the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market20 Aug 2035
“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 The request is on a desk at Roda, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets20 Aug 2035
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Roda have done the hard part with Willem II, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Transfer targets20 Aug 2035
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: AZ keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Match18 Aug 2035
Jong Ajax left with the points after a 1‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Boardroom20 Aug 2035
Still no name above the door at Roda
Day 11 of the vacancy. Candidates have been priced, sounded out and quietly ruled out — and the caretaker’s win ratio is becoming an argument all by itself.
Squad20 Aug 2035
Words at Roda training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Noa El Hamdaoui 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.
Transfer targets20 Aug 2035
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market12 Feb 2035
The deal that would have taken Jared Westveer to VVV-Venlo has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Roda with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Squad12 Feb 2035
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Arnaut Van de Beek has, at Roda, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad12 Feb 2035
A falling-out at Roda
Hamza Ouzinebe and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets12 Feb 2035
Roda asked and PSV said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad12 Feb 2035
Noa El Hamdaoui 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.
Squad12 Feb 2035
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Arnaut Van de Beek commits to Roda for another 4 years.
Match6 Feb 2035
Jong PSV left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Match10 Feb 2035
Helmond Sport made Roda work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Match10 Feb 2035
It had gone 5 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market18 Dec 2034
“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.
Squad18 Dec 2034
Words exchanged at Roda
Hamza Ouzinebe 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.
Squad18 Dec 2034
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Yahvan Niat and Roda agree another 3 years.
Squad18 Dec 2034
A row about effort at Roda
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Levi Baars was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad18 Dec 2034
Every long career reaches the week the last one is thought about. He would like it to be where he started, and Roda know now that the thought has arrived.
Match16 Dec 2034
It finished 1‑0, and it was Luis Rivas’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Roda.
The dugout18 Dec 2034
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Matteo Giorgetti, and the manager let it.
The dugout18 Dec 2034
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Interim Coach, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
The dugout18 Dec 2034
Manuel Maluenda is still being punished for one mistake
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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings6 Nov 2034
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.58, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market6 Nov 2034
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Memphis Van de Beek will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Roda the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Player ratings6 Nov 2034
A hand in 2 of them from Luis Rivas — 7.66
Marked 7.66. There is a kind of forward whose value only shows up when you count what he was involved in rather than what he finished, and this is the day that argument makes itself.
Squad6 Nov 2034
A falling-out at Roda
Vasco Tritten and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad6 Nov 2034
Jared Westveer 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.
The terraces6 Nov 2034
Roda supporters have found a favourite in Denzel Gakpo
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Denzel Gakpo 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.
Match31 Oct 2034
It finished 2‑0, and it was Denzel Gakpo’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Roda.
The dugout6 Nov 2034
“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.
Match4 Nov 2034
A goal on 94 minutes turned three points into one and a good afternoon into an argument about game management that will run until Saturday.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match30 Sep 2034
Chastening afternoon for Roda
A 1‑4 beating by Helmond Sport was the sort of result that empties a stadium long before the final whistle.
Match30 Sep 2034
5 matches without a win for Roda
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Roda are no longer polite ones.
Squad2 Oct 2034
Words exchanged at Roda
Vasco Tritten 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.
Squad2 Oct 2034
“The easiest signature of my career.” Luis Rivas and Roda agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad2 Oct 2034
A row about effort at Roda
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Noa El Hamdaoui was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout2 Oct 2034
Jérôme Déom gets it from the manager
“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.
Boardroom2 Oct 2034
Doors closed at Roda
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
Boardroom2 Oct 2034
Wages swallow 102% of the Roda income
Every club 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 it has been tried.
The dugout2 Oct 2034
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad12 Jun 2034
The knee: Reda Akmum out for 42 days
42 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Roda lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market12 Jun 2034
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Volendam waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Roda is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market12 Jun 2034
“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.
Transfer targets12 Jun 2034
The deal with NEC is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets12 Jun 2034
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Ajax is saying, and nobody at Roda is enjoying the guessing.
Transfer targets12 Jun 2034
The offer went to Vitesse this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Squad12 Jun 2034
Words exchanged at Roda
Vasco Tritten 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.
Squad12 Jun 2034
Akhanyile Norawana 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.
Squad12 Jun 2034
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Jared Westveer commits to Roda for another 3 years.