Marked for David Vicari
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market7 Sep 2026
Juve Stabia come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Spezia did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad7 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spezia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Gioele Conte is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad7 Sep 2026
“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.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Marked 8.03 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
10 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at Spezia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elton 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.
Match5 Sep 2026
Spezia and Cesena take a point apiece
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Market7 Sep 2026
Experience through the door at Spezia
Elton arrives at 36 with nothing left to prove and plenty left to pass on. Legs are a young man's currency; knowing where to stand never ages.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market10 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Petko Hristov commits to Spezia for another 4 years.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Tempers go at Spezia
Petko Hristov 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
36 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Emanuele Adamo asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Market10 Aug 2026
Siracusa are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Spezia will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Aleš Matějů and Spezia agree another 3 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spezia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market3 Aug 2026
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Spezia have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Vanja Vlahović 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
Mattia Valoti is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Spezia has been clear about where Mattia Valoti stands, which is more than many ever get.
Market3 Aug 2026
36 months and counting on Aleš Matějů
Still no offer on the table, and Aleš Matějů’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.