Marked for Francesco Cereser
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad9 Oct 2028
There were 7 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Market9 Oct 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Casarano they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad9 Oct 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Karlo Lulić and Casarano agree another 2 years.
Squad9 Oct 2028
Words at Casarano training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ismael Cajazzo 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.
Market9 Oct 2028
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Squad9 Oct 2028
A falling-out at Casarano
Francesco Cereser and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom9 Oct 2028
89% of the income goes out in wages at Casarano
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.
Match7 Oct 2028
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout9 Oct 2028
The manager makes an example of Thiago Serrano
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Aug 2028
Vito Leonetti damages knee ligaments — 33 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 33 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.
Match21 Aug 2028
Casarano sink to position 14
25 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Transfer targets21 Aug 2028
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: AS Roma keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Boardroom21 Aug 2028
5 academy graduates step up at Casarano
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Market21 Aug 2028
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Franco De Luca has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market21 Aug 2028
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Valentino Ceccarelli has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market21 Aug 2028
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Sebastiano Farina is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market21 Aug 2028
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Teodoro Spinelli is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Boardroom21 Aug 2028
A promise the Casarano board did not keep
There was a commitment, there was a date, and the date went past. Trust at a football club takes years to build and one afternoon to spend.
In brief
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Squad
8 new faces, and Casarano are still learning each other
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Squad
Tempers go at Casarano
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Boardroom
Casarano turn down the training-ground plan
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The dugout24 Apr 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Cosimo Patierno, and the manager let it.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
Ertijon Gega gets picked when it counts
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Ertijon Gega is on it.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Casarano, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market24 Apr 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Federico Giraudo’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Market24 Apr 2028
2 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Casarano could get for him.
Market24 Apr 2028
Casarano have let the market know Borna Knezović can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match15 Jan 2028
The wait goes on for Casarano
14 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.
Market17 Jan 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Casarano can pretend not to have heard.
Market17 Jan 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Casarano is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Transfer targets17 Jan 2028
$720.0K was the most the club would pay and Cremonese were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
The terraces17 Jan 2028
Boards get told what they have done wrong for years and hear nothing on the days they get it right. This is one of those days: Francesco Cereser from Torino for $630.0K, and a ticket office having a very good morning.
Transfer targets17 Jan 2028
Casarano asked and Cremonese said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Match15 Jan 2028
1‑2 to Sorrento, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout17 Jan 2028
The manager makes an example of Cosimo Chiricò
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market17 Jan 2028
He is 20, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match8 Jan 2028
The wait goes on for Casarano
13 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.
Market10 Jan 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 Casarano, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market10 Jan 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Niccolò Zanellato will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Casarano the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Transfer targets10 Jan 2028
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Casarano have done the hard part with Torino, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Boardroom10 Jan 2028
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Niccolò Zanellato 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.
Squad10 Jan 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 Casarano this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets10 Jan 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.
Match8 Jan 2028
1‑2 to Audace Cerignola, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout10 Jan 2028
The manager makes an example of Borna Knezović
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.